The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has linked the rise in air passenger traffic in Africa on what it called the business confidence which has risen sharply in Nigeria over the past 15 months.
While business confidence has dramatically risen, IATA said a reduction in political uncertainty in South Africa contributed to an improvement in business confidence there for the first time in more than a year.
This is coming as the clearing house for global airlines announced global passenger traffic results for February showing a rebound in traffic growth following the slower demand experienced in January, which was owing to temporary factors including the later timing of the Lunar New Year in 2018.
According to the figure released on Thursday and emailed to our correspondent in Lagos, African airlines experienced a 6.3 percent rise in traffic for the month compared to the year-ago period.
The growth occurred amid an improving regional economic backdrop.
Across the region, seat capacity rose 3.3%, and load factor (the proportion of available capacity taken up by the market) climbed 1.9 percentage points to 67.8 percent.
Total revenue passenger kilometers (RPKs) for the month rose 7.6%, compared to February 2017, up from 4.6% year-over-year growth in January. Monthly capacity (available seat kilometers or ASKs) increased by 6.3%, and load factor rose 0.9 percentage point to 80.4%, surpassing the previous record for the month of 79.5%, which was set in February 2017.
IATA’s Director General and CEO, Alexandre de Juniac said, “As expected, we saw a return to stronger demand growth in February, after the temporary slow-down in January. This is being supported by the robust economic backdrop and solid business confidence. However, increases in fuel prices–and labour costs in some countries–likely will temper the amount of traffic stimulation from lower airfares this year”.
February international passenger demand rose 7.2% compared to February 2017, which was up from the 4.2% increase recorded in January. (Daily Trust)
