Iraq fastens its seatbelt

The recent Iraqi elections were hailed as one of the best indications yet that the country was returning to a calmer existence. But, writes Brendan Gallagher, the green shoots of normality made their first appearance at Baghdad Airport several months earlier.

Six months ago a group of British executives flew into Baghdad International. Of course they weren’t the first foreigners to arrive in the Iraqi capital in search of post-war business. But they entered the history books as the first official trade mission from the UK to arrive by public air transport.
The delegation included Ray Stirton, business development manager for a company that provides specialist materials for construction of oil and gas wells. “The oil and gas sector in Iraq is enormous,” he said. “There are proven oil reserves of 115 billion barrels, the third largest total in the world, and there could be more beneath the Western Desert. The Iraqis aim to triple production here by 2015. We wanted to get in early and make local companies aware of how we can help them.”
Stirton is typical of the would-be vendors travelling to Iraq in increasing numbers, attracted by the opportunity and reassured by improving security and restoration of the infrastructure – electricity is now available 15 hours a day in urban areas, the banking system is working well, there’s BlackBerry connectivity in the major cities, and the main airports are up, running and open for business.
One of the first carriers in the region to restore Iraq to its route structure was Gulf Air. Bahrain’s national airline launched a five-times-weekly Airbus A320 service to Baghdad at the beginning of last September, with Najaf following at the end of the month and Erbil in Kurdistan added in October. The airline has also announced plans to serve the southern port city of Basra and one other destination.
“The inclusion of Iraq in our regional network makes absolute sense both geographically and economically,” said chief executive Samer Majali. “There is a clear demand for a direct service from Bahrain. We are creating a connection that is essential for the economic redevelopment of Iraq and which will enable us to take full advantage of the rapid growth the country will experience as global business and cultural links build up.”
Many see the resumption of normal trade between Iraq and the rest of the world as the prime driver for the restoration of air services, with business-class traffic predominating. But other demographics could also contribute to the business case. Gulf Air expects to see its seats filled not only by business travellers from finance and investment companies, the oil and minerals industries, and security and construction but also, as the country becomes more accessible, by growing numbers of pilgrims and visiting friends and relations.
Starting in 1976, Gulf Air was the first GCC airline to ever to serve Iraq, and was the first to resume post-war service. Some of the big names in Western Europe, with Lufthansa in the lead, have also declared their readiness to take a bet on going back to the Iraqi capital. The trail was blazed for the German flag carrier by subsidiary Austrian Airlines, which became the first Western European airline to restart operations in Iraq when it launched a service to Erbil as long ago as 2007.
Another Lufthansa acquisition, bmi of the UK, last year announced that it was “ready and willing” to start London-Baghdad services as soon as it had authorisation. “It makes geographical and economic sense for us to add Iraq to our growing network of services to the region,” said Nigel Turner, chief executive at the time and now deputy chairman. “Iraq is surrounded on four sides by countries that we already serve from Heathrow. We are carrying an ever-increasing number of passengers who at the moment travel from Baghdad to Heathrow via our existing intermediate point of Amman.”
Turner said the airline envisaged a daily service from Heathrow to Baghdad with an intermediate stop, probably at Amman, with traffic coming not only from business and government but also from visiting friends and families.
Now Lufthansa itself is getting ready to go to Erbil and also to push on south to Baghdad. Services via Frankfurt and Munich are due to launch this summer, as soon as traffic rights have been secured and additional infrastructure put in place. The airline positions the plan as part of a strategy to expand its network in the Middle East, which currently stands at 14 destinations in eleven countries.
The new services will bring Lufthansa back to Iraq after a 20-year absence that started when it withdrew from the country at the start of the First Gulf War.

In the meantime, Air France’s consulting division is advising the renascent Iraqi Airways on restoring its services to Paris following signature of a traffic agreement last autumn.
Iraq’s national carrier currently operates a small fleet comprising four Boeing 737 Classics and a 767-200 to Amman, Beirut, Damascus, Dubai, Istanbul and Tehran. It also serves Stockholm via Athens and says that it secured British approval last year for flights to London. The carrier’s emerging route development plans are backed by government-underwritten orders Boeing for 30 Boeing 737-800s and ten 787s.
Air transport normalisation in Iraq is still something of a tender young plant. But it’s being carefully cultivated both inside the country and out, and if the present political progress continues there is a good chance that within the next five years Iraq will take its rightful place as part of the success story that is Middle Eastern aviation.