PASSENGER traffic for September rose 57% year-on-year (y-o-y), showing that the recovery in air travel continues to be strong, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) said.

According to IATA, globally traffic is now at 73.8% of September 2019 levels.

“Even with economic and geopolitical uncertainties, the demand for air transport continues to recover ground.

“The outlier is still China with its pursuit of a zero-Covid strategy keeping borders largely closed and creating a demand roller coaster ride for its domestic market, with September being down 46.4% on the previous year.

“That is in sharp contrast to the rest of Asia Pacific, which, despite China’s dismal performance, posted a 464.8% increase for international traffic compared to the year-ago period,” IATA director-general Willie Walsh said in a statement.

IATA said domestic traffic for September was up 6.9% against the same month last year, while international traffic climbed 122.2% versus September 2021. All markets reported strong growth, led by Asia Pacific.

Meanwhile, global air cargo markets showed that demand had softened after falling 10.6% y-o-y compared with September 2021, but continued to track at near pre-pandemic levels (-3.6%).

Walsh said while air cargo’s activity continued to track near to 2019 levels, volumes remained below last year’s exceptional performance as the industry faced some headwinds.

“At the consumer level, with travel restrictions lifting post-pandemic, people are likely to spend more on vacation travel and less on e-commerce.

“And at the macro-level, increasing recession warnings are likely to have a negative impact on the global flows of goods and services, balanced slightly by a stabilisation of oil prices,” he said. – Bernama, November 7, 2022.