IATA Director-General Willie Walsh said he is “very positive” about the recovery, with the number of airport pairs connected by direct air service set to return above the 20,000 mark this year.
The way international airlines think about the greater Chinese market, including Hong Kong, has significantly changed over the course of the pandemic and the industry is now more wary of Beijing’s policies, according to IATA Director General Willie Walsh.
While airlines are reporting a strong demand environment going into the northern hemisphere summer, the full restoration of global airline networks is likely years away, IATA DG Willie Walsh told Aviation Week Network editors.
The days of long-term relationships between airports and airlines are unlikely to return in the immediate future, according to IATA’s Regional VP for the Americas Peter Cerda.
Governments across the Americas need to “fundamentally change their mindset” and how they collaborate with the aviation industry otherwise the recovery will stall, delegates at Routes Americas 2022 in San Antonio have heard.
Short-term blanket travel bans imposed on certain countries are not good news for an aviation industry that is still in recovery mode and had dared to hope that governments would adopt a more data-driven approach in response to emerging variants.
