IATA, ACI record rise in passenger traffic in 2014

INTERNATIONAL Air Transport Association (IATA), covering 84 per cent of the total air traffic in the world has revealed that global airlines flew 3.3 billion passengers in 2024 according to the report of its traffic results of last year.

  IATA has announced that global passenger traffic results for the full year of 2014 showed demand (revenue passenger kilometers or RPKs) rose by 5.9 per cent compared to the full year of 2013. 

  It added that this 2014 performance was above the 10-year average growth rate of 5.6 per cent and the 5.2 per cent annual growth experienced in 2013 compared to 2012.

  According to IATA, capacity rose 5.6 per cent last year, with the result that load factor climbed 0.2 percentage points to 79.7 per cent. All regions saw demand grow in 2014. More than half of the growth in passenger travel occurred on airlines in emerging markets including Asia-Pacific and the Middle East. 

  The association also noted that in recent months domestic market growth played a large role in driving growth. This is owed mainly to a pick-up in Chinese domestic travel, which expanded by some 11 per cent in 2014 over the previous year, it pointed.

The Director General and Chief Executive Officer, IATA, Tony Tyler said:“Demand for the passenger business did well in 2014. With a 5.9 per cent expansion of demand, the industry out-performed the 10-year average growth rate. Carriers in the Middle East posted double-digit growth while results in Africa were barely above previous-year levels. Overall a record 3.3 billion passengers boarded aircraft last year, some 170 million more than in 2013.        

   “While it is clear that people will continue to travel in growing numbers, there have been signs in recent months that softening business confidence is translating into a leveling off of international travel demand”.

  Meanwhile, ACI EUROPE, the European region of Airports Council International, the only worldwide professional association of airport operators has revealed that during 2014, passenger traffic at Europe’s airports grew by an average 5.4 per cent. 

   Specifically, it noted that passenger traffic in the EU grew by a healthy 4.9 per cent, with Greece, Luxembourg, Lithuania, Portugal, Romania, Belgium and Ireland significantly outperforming the EU average.

  Also, countries such as Poland, France, Germany, Austria, Latvia and the Czech Republic all saw airport traffic growing below this average.

However, non-EU airports posted a dynamic passenger traffic growth of 7.3 per cent with Serbia, Iceland, FYROM, Georgia and Turkey all growing well above this average.

  Freight traffic across the European airport network grew by 3.6 per cent with a similar performance between EU and non-EU airports (+3.6 per cent and 3.3 per cent respectively). Aircraft movements were up +2.6 percent, reflecting additional airline capacity in the market. 

  However, the bulk of this additional capacity was deployed at non-EU airports as these saw aircraft movements increase by 5.6 per cent compared to just 1.5 per cent at EU airports.