Heathrow remains in the top five busiest airports but saw one of the smallest growths in 2012.
Europe only experienced a 1.7% growth last year compared to 13% in the Middle East, 8% in Asia Pacific, 7.6% in Latin American-Caribbean and 6.1% in Africa.
North America only grew by 1.3% in passenger numbers, according to ACI World’s 2012 World Annual Traffic Report.
But while Heathrow is ranked number three in terms of passenger numbers, its growth in 2012 was only 0.9%.
Atlanta in the US was ranked in first place and saw 3.4% growth, Beijing was second and saw 4.1% growth while Jakarta in ninth position and Dubai in tenth position saw growth of 12.1% and 13.2% respectively.
The report said 65% of airports worldwide saw passenger growth which averaged 7%.
Worldwide airport passenger numbers increased by 4.4% in 2012 to 5.7 billion.
London chief executives are today confronting Sir Howard Davies about immediate action on airport capacity, see separate story.
