GENEVA – The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has released international traffic data for January that points to a slowdown in global demand.
Asia Pacific carriers saw a marginal drop in demand growth from 6.2% in December to 5.7% in January.
Despite the weak Japanese economy, carriers in the region benefited from increased competitiveness due to the strong Euro and the booming economies of both India and China.
Year-on-year international passenger demand grew by 4.3% in January. This is sharply down from the 6.7% growth recorded in December and the 7.4% recorded for the full-year of 2007.
Capacity growth of 4.2% saw load factors inch up to 75.1%.
At 0.3%, European carriers saw the largest fall (from 5.5% in December) and weakest growth of all regions.
While intra-Europe traffic remained relatively strong, the largest drop came in long-haul markets. This is largely due the strong Euro weakening the competitiveness of Europe’s airlines.
Middle Eastern growth slowed sharply to 7.4% but IATA said this seems due to slower growth in capacity rather than any change in the strong oil-driven upward trend in growth.
