IATA released (04-Sep-2018) a report on India's aviation market, focused on the challenges of realising the "economic and social benefits of an Indian aviation industry that has tremendous potential for continued high-speed demand growth". Key findings include:
- Growth rate: Traffic to/from/within India doubled from 2010 (79 million) to 2017 (158 million). Traffic is expected to treble to 520 million by 2037;
- Economic contribution: Aviation in India supports 7.5 million jobs - 390,000 directly, 570,000 in the value chain, and 6.2 million in tourism - and contributes around USD30 billion p/a to national GDP;
- Domestic market: India will be the third largest domestic aviation market, behind the US and China:
- There were 98 million domestic passenger trips in 2017, equal 7.3% of India's population;
- Domestic load factors are high, hitting a record 90% in Feb-2018;
- After adjusting for inflation, average domestic fares fell by more than 70% since 2005;
- The number of domestic airport pairs is 700 (up 50% on 2015);
- LCCs account for about 70% of domestic seats;
- International market: Consistently growing more slowly than the domestic market:
- In 2017 there were about 60 million international journeys to/from India;
- LCCs account for about 25% of international capacity;
- India is directly linked to 304 international destinations, up from 230 in 2008;
- About 41% of India's direct international connectivity is to the Middle East - much of it to Gulf hubs of UAE and Qatar;
- Air cargo market: Grew 16.9% year-on-year to one million tonnes in 2017:
- The UAE is India's largest cargo market (+30%). Ethiopia is the fastest growing of the main markets (+114% on 2016);
- Delhi and Mumbai are India's largest cargo hubs;
- Mumbai (+18.1%) and Chennai (+17.2%) are the fastest growing Indian cargo hubs. [more - original PR]