Asian air traffic surges despite economic concerns
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Air traffic in the Asia Pacific region continues to experience strong growth, despite economic concerns caused by the Chinese stock market crisis.
According to the latest data from IATA, the region’s airlines saw an 8.5% rise in international passenger traffic in July 2015, with average load factors climbing to 80%. This exceeds the growth rates of the world’s two other major regions, Europe (+6.7%) and North America (+5.3%).
And in terms of domestic traffic, Asia’s major markets continued to see soaring demand for flights. In China, domestic traffic jumped 10.9% despite the country’s economic woes, while in India domestic passenger demand surged 28.1%. The global average for domestic passenger traffic growth was +7.6%.
But despite the strong results, IATA urged caution.
“July results were strongly positive but slowing global trade and the wild gyrations of stock exchanges around the globe suggest that we may be in for some turbulence in coming months,” said Tony Tyler, IATA’s director general & CEO.
“The downward movement in stock markets around the globe reflects investors’ growing concerns about slowing trade and economic growth in emerging economies, as well as China’s continued shift towards domestic markets,” he added.
For the first seven months of the year, global air passenger traffic has now increased 6.5% (+6.6% international and +6.4% domestic), with average aircraft load factors of 80.1%.
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