India's air transport sector will see a capacity increase of 0.7 per cent in 2009 though the global aviation sector will incur a loss of nearly $5 billion, the IATA has said.
India, whose market for international air services tripled in size between 2000 and 2008, was expected to see capacity increase by 0.7 per cent in 2009, while demand dropped between two and three per cent, International Air Transport Association (IATA) Director-General and CEO Giovanni Bisignani said at a teleconference in Geneva yesterday.
Citing rapid deterioration in global economic conditions as the reason for the drop, Bisignani said, "The state of the airline industry today is grim. Demand has deteriorated much more rapidly with the economic slowdown than could have been anticipated even a few months ago."
"Our loss forecast for 2009 is now $4.7 billion. Combined with an industry debt of $170 billion, pressure on the industry balance sheet is extreme," he said adding that industry revenues were expected to fall by 12 per cent or $62 billion to $467 billion this year.
Asian regions would also be seeing a decline in air transport, he said adding that the region was expected to see a 6.8 per cent fall in demand.
International demand to and from China was expected to contract by between five to 10 per cent over the year.
The Middle East would be the only region with demand growth in 2009 (1.2 per cent) but this would be overshadowed by the impact of a 3.8 per cent increase in capacity, he said.