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IATA: Asia-Pacific traffic up 5.2% in February
April 13th 2017
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has announced that Asia-Pacific airlines’ February traffic grew 5.2% year-on-year, maintaining the strong momentum of the past few months. Read More » Intra-Asia traffic remained robust, IATA said, while Asia-Europe traffic continued its recovery from last year’s terrorism-related slowdown. Capacity increased 2.9% in February and loads rose 1.7%, to 79.8%.
Globally, total revenue passenger kilometres (RPKs) grew 4.8% in February but this is a distorted figure because of the leap month. The adjusted underlying growth rate has been estimated at 8.6%, just under January’s increase of 8.9%. Monthly capacity (ASKs) increased by 2.7%, while the average load factor rose 1.6% to 79.5%, the highest ever recorded for February.
“The strong demand momentum from January has continued, supported by lower fares and a healthier economic backdrop. Although we remain concerned about the impact of any travel restrictions or closing of borders, we have not seen the attempted U.S. ban on travel from six countries translate into an identifiable traffic trend. Overall, travel demand continues to grow at a robust rate,” said Alexandre de Juniac, IATA’s director-general and CEO.
IATA estimated that allowing for inflation, the price of air travel has fallen by more than 10% in real terms in the past year, accounting for more than half of the growth in RPKs in early 2017.
