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Airports in the Middle East and Europe have suffered the worst losses due to the coronavirus pandemic this year, with total passenger numbers for the whole 2020 expected to register the biggest decline of nearly three quarters, according to an analysis.
“Europe and the Middle East are forecast to be the two most impacted regions with declines above 70 percent compared to the projected baseline,” Airports Council International (ACI) said in a report released this month.
Airports, airlines and other players in the air transport sector, have been among the hardest hit by the falloff in travel demand due to the health outbreak.
Despite the easing of restrictions and resumption of flights, air transport continues to suffer, although some airlines in the region have reported an uptick in demand for December. Across the world, passenger traffic in the first half of 2021 will remain heavily impacted as vaccination campaigns are rolled out and organised, ACI said.
2020 impact
By the end of 2020, passenger air traffic in the Middle East will fall by 70.6 percent. The impact of the COVID-19 crisis on airport revenues in the region will result in a severe reduction of more than 73 percent in revenues, or roughly $9.7 billion.
In terms or revenue shortfall, however, Europe is the most affected region in absolute terms with revenues set to decline by $40.8 billion for the whole year. “In relative terms, the sharpest fall was recorded by the Middle East with a reduction of 73.5 percent of revenues,” ACI said.
Prior to the crisis, the airport industry was expected to generate about $172 billion in 2020. However, due to the outbreak, airports have experienced an “unprecedented” fall of $111.8 billion in revenues for 2020, a reduction of 65 percent.
Air traffic is vital to the airport business. Airports generate a huge chunk of their revenues from charges related to passengers and aircraft operations. As traffic declines, airports’ ability to collect these charges also falls proportionately, ACI said.
Besides airports, airlines around the world have been suffering billions of dollars in revenue losses due to the decline in passenger numbers this year.
Travel demand improves
However, things could improve over the coming months, with the COVID-19 vaccine now being rolled out in many markets around the world.
Tim Clark, president of Emirates Airlines said recently that flight bookings have already started to pick up this month, following the creation of the UK-UAE travel corridor.
“With the corridor being created between the United Kingdom and the UAE, we’ve taken advantage of that and we’re already seeing large demand increases. The booking velocity has certainly increased from the middle of December onwards,” Clark told Euronews.
Early this month, the airline reported that approximately half a million passengers were booked for flights prior to Christmas, starting December 8 until December 21.
(Reporting by Cleofe Maceda; editing by Seban Scaria)
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