Etihad Airways continues Africa expansion with new flights to Lagos, Nigeria

Etihad Airways today announced the launch of flights to Lagos, the airline’s first destination in West Africa, from July 1, subject to regulatory approvals.
The direct flights will link Abu Dhabi and Lagos six times a week and will be operated by a two class A330-200 aircraft with 22 Pearl Business class and 240 Coral Economy seats.

Lagos becomes the 83rd destination in Etihad Airways’ global network and the return flights will create a new link between Nigeria, Africa’s third largest economy, and the United Arab Emirates.

Following the launch of services to the Seychelles in November 2011, Tripoli last month and Nairobi in April, the addition of Nigeria marks another milestone in Etihad Airways’ African expansion plans.

James Hogan, Etihad Airways President and Chief Executive Officer, said: “The launch of flights to Lagos is consistent with our strategy of targeting areas of strong growth in emerging markets.

“The United Arab Emirates is a major trade partner of Nigeria, which has a population of more than 150 million people, the largest in Africa and the seventh biggest in the world.

“The country is rich in natural resources, such as oil and natural gas. Our new point-to-point services will strengthen the oil and gas links between the UAE and Nigeria and facilitate further growth in these industries.

”The country is also enjoying strong economic growth driven by significant foreign investment, particularly from China, which means there is increasing demand for travel between Lagos and other emerging economies.

“The Lagos schedule will provide seamless connections over Abu Dhabi to key North and Southeast Asian destinations and markets in the India Subcontinent and Australia.”

Ethiopian Airlines makes ad hoc flight to Seychelles with 152 Chinese tourists on eve of Spring Festival

The Ethiopian Airlines, one of the leading Airliners in Africa, on Sunday made a special flight to Seychelles, its newest destination with a group of about 152 Chinese tourists on the eve of the Chinese Spring Festival.

The Ethiopian which made test flight on Sunday promoting its new destination, will be starting regular flights to the Island on the Indian Ocean very close to Africa in April 2012 expecting good economic dividend from the business to Seychelles.

Esayas Woldemariam, Senior Vice President of Global Sales, and Xie Xiaoyan, Chinese Ambassador to Ethiopia, along with Chinese diplomats and Ethiopian Staff on Sunday welcomed the Chinese tourists who landed in Addis Ababa Bole International Airport for transit from Beijing. The tourists are to spend their holiday-times of Chinese Spring Festival enjoying sun scene, sand and sea in Seychelles which is a destination for holiday makers and honeymoon among others.

Esayas noted on the occasion of the welcoming ceremony at the Airport that the Ethiopian Airlines is very happy to welcome the Chinese to Seychelles, a tourist destination in Africa through Ethiopia, which is a gateway from China to the African continent.

"We are very happy to welcome this first group of Chinese to Seychelles, which is going to be one of our biggest destinations in the future," said the Vice President.

The Ethiopian Airlines has about 42 destinations in Africa, said Esayas.

He said the Ethiopian Airlines which has been flying to China since the 1970s being the first Airliner to fly to a destination of fastest growing economy, has now about 23 flights a week to China.

Esayas told Xinhua particularly that Seychelles, a tourist destination mostly visited by Europeans is now being visited by Chinese tourists, who are affording anything and travelling everywhere.

"Seychelles is the newest destination of the Ethiopian Airlines in the Indian Ocean and it is part of Africa and it is a holiday destination. Mostly, it is visited by European tourists and holiday makers, and honey moon destination. But, now the Chinese are affording anything and they are travelling everywhere; so, we now are trying to bring them to Africa in a very big way," said Esayas.

"When they come to Seychelles, Kenya or Tanzania or South Africa they also have a taste of Ethiopia and we arrange package tours for tourists also to stay in Ethiopia for a few days going to northern historic routes and southern cultural and natural routes for them also to explore Ethiopia," added Esayas.

According to the Vice President, the Ethiopian has been increasing number of flights to China, which is one of the largest trading partners of Africa.

Currently Beijing, Guangzhou, Hong Kong, and Hangzhou are the four destinations of the Ethiopian in China, said Esayas.

The Vice President also said the Ethiopian Airlines provides transport services of both passengers and cargo to help and facilitate the trade, investment and cultural exchanges Africa has with its giant economic partner.

"Now China is being the largest trading partner to Africa; and so, the Ethiopian Airlines should provide the transportation vehicle; the transport logistic is very much vital for facilitating trade and investment, tourism and cultural exchanges between China and Africa," said Esayas.

The Ethiopian Airlines has been one of Africa's carriers flying for the last 65 years with its efficiency, safety and operational success.

It made its maiden international flight to Cairo, Egypt in 1946.

African Airlines start joint fuel plan to lower costs

Nine African airlines are to jointly source for jet fuel as a way of reducing costs in an unpredictable international oil market.

The nine, all members of the African Airlines Association (AFRAA), have already concluded evaluating tender bids from fuel companies.

“We expect that there will be reasonable savings from the project,” Kenya Airways finance director Alex Mbugua said at a press conference in Nairobi on Wednesday.

The nine airlines are: Kenya Airways, Ethiopian Airlines, Precision Air, Air Malawi, RwandAir, Air Namibia, TAAG Angola Airlines, LAM Mozambique Airlines and Air Seychelles.

The Joint Aviation Fuel Purchase Project will see the airlines sign year-long contracts for a cumulative 700 million litres of fuel worth over $1.5 billion.

AFRAA is an umbrella body for 32 airlines whose purpose is to foster commercial and technical co-operation among themselves. Its members represent 83 per cent of the total international traffic carried by African airlines.

The association says unity among the carriers will give them increased clout in price negotiation. They will also attain a stable unit price of fuel for the participating airlines.

The new fuel regime will take effect this year once existing fuel purchase contracts expire. However, it will not affect existent hedging contracts.
“Hedging contracts are signed with financial institutions. The two are not necessarily linked,” said Mr Mbugua.

Skyrocketing fuel prices have eaten into aviation industry revenues, with recent estimates indicating that they constitute 40 to 50 per cent of airline operating costs.

The fuel purchase project is expected to make African carriers more competitive internationally. “Oil taxes and charges are very high in Africa, making airlines in the region uncompetitive,” said AFRAA secretary general Elijah Chingosho.

“This tax will mean additional punitive costs to airlines that are already handicapped by high fuel charges and taxes,” said Dr Chingosho.

Brussels Airlines to further expand in Africa and launch New York but cut back in Europe

Brussels Airlines plans to further expand capacity on African routes in 2012 while shrinking its European operation as Boeing 737s are phased out as part of a narrowbody fleet simplification initiative. The Lufthansa Group subsidiary will also resume flights to New York in 2012, a move made possible by expansion of its A330 fleet and designed primarily to better serve the fast-growing US-Africa market.

Africa has been a second home market and the main focus for Brussels Airlines since it became part of the Lufthansa Group and entered the Star Alliance in 2009. The carrier is keen to continue this focus as the European market becomes even more challenging for small flag carriers given the region’s banking crisis and increasing competition from low-cost carriers. As an emerging market with huge potential and limited competition, Africa offers carriers from mature markets opportunities for growth and the increasingly unusual combination of high yields plus high load factors.

Although it is a relatively small carrier by Western European standards, Brussels Airlines is uniquely positioned to exploit the potential opportunities in Africa because of its African roots. Belgium has longstanding economic, cultural and economic ties with Africa. Predecessor carrier Sabena served the continent for over 75 years before ceasing operations in 2001.

Star Alliance wings intensify battle for African Skies

Star Alliance has upped the battle for African skies by enlisting Ethiopian Airlines.

Ethiopian now becomes the third African airline after South African Airways and Egypt Air to join the alliance that boasts of 29 global carriers.

"With Ethiopian Airlines now part of the Star Alliance network, we offer our customers the widest choice of flights connecting to, from and within Africa," said Jaan Albrecht, the outgoing Star Alliance CEO.

Through its Star Alliance membership, the airline now offers customers the benefits of being a member of a global airline alliance with a world-wide reach via the extensive network, seamless travel and status recognition through the frequent flyer programmes.

"This new partnership will bring enormous choices and flexibility to our customers such as daily departures to more than 1,000 destinations and free use of lounges at a number of airports around the globe," said Tewolde GebreMariam, Ethiopian CEO.

The partnership will delivery more passengers to Ethiopian travelling to African destinations ferried by Star Alliance carriers.

"We now anticipate to grow passenger numbers more than the current 40 per cent annual growth," GebreMariam said.

The Star network was established in 1997 to offer worldwide reach, recognition and seamless service to travellers. The network offers more than 21,000 daily fights to 1,290 airports in 189 countries.

It is a common trend for airlines to team up in alliances to counter the cut-throat competition in the industry.

Other global alliances include Oneworld and Skyteam. National carrier Kenya Airways is a member of Skyteam, which comprises airlines such as Delta, China Eastern, KLM and Air France.

Following the Star Alliance partnership, Ethiopian Sheba Miles participants can now earn miles when flying on any Star Alliance Member carrier, with the collected miles counting towards achieving ShebaMiles Silver Club or Gold Club status.

The carrier will extend the Alliance Silver and Gold benefits to customers from other Star Alliance member carriers when they fly the airline.

Air Malawi resume Flights to South Africa after eight days on the ground

Air Malawi resume Flights to South Africa on Thursday after being grounded for eight days due to the unavailability of its Boeing 737-200 and ATR 42.

Air Malawi ceased flying on November 16. In a statement the airline said its lease agreement with Bravo Capital Limited for its Boeing 737-200 had expired and that it was in the process of sourcing a better, more reliable and efficient aircraft. The Boeing’s main route was to Johannesburg.

“As such all flights to Johannesburg have temporarily been suspended for a period of two weeks. It is estimated that these flights will resume on 1st December 2011,” Air Malawi said.

The flag carrier’s only other aircraft, an ATR 42, had been undergoing maintenance, and Air Malawi said it would resume operations on November 21 for flights to Lilongwe, Blantyre, Harare, Lusaka and Dar-es-Salaam. However, that day came and went due to what Air Malawi head of marketing Tony Chimpukuso described as prolonged maintenance. The ATR 42 only resumed flights last Thursday.

“The aircraft will resume its operations today because everything is now fixed as it went through C-check maintenance for a week,” Chimpukuso said on Thursday.

“The ATR 42 did not resume its operations on Monday because there were some other prescribed jobs that were not evaluated that was why we shifted the date to Thursday because we needed more time to fix the problems,” Chimpukuso added.

Although the ATR 42 is now flying, Air Malawi’s flights to Johannesburg remain suspended “until arrangements to lease a better and more reliable aircraft have been finalised.”

Air Malawi had two Boeing 737s but these are stuck in South Africa as the airline has no money to pay the maintenance company that has taken possession of them.

Air Malawi is in dire financial straights, with some inside sources reporting its debt level at around K10 billion (US$59.8 million), according to the Nyasa Times.

Air Malawi’s chief executive officer Patrick Chilambe said that the government is restructuring the airline after it posted an after-tax loss of K1.1 billion (US$6.6 million) last year and a K1.3 billion (US$7.7 million) loss in 2009, according to the Malawi government’s Annual Economic Report for this year. Chilambe said the restructuring is being carried out by consultant Ernst & Young and will take two months.

“As you are aware, we have been going through hard times in recent years. The whole idea of the restructuring exercise is to take stock of what has happened in the past and shape a better future for the company,” Chilambe said.

Since 2000, the Malawian government has attempted on two occasions to privatise the airline. The first attempt in 2003 failed because of the successful bidder, in partnership with South African Airways, being unable to post a security bond. The second attempt in 2007 failed after disagreements over the terms with the bidder, Comair of South Africa.

South African Airways expands African routes

South African Airways has announced an expansion of its African routes into the Congo as well as a new international route to China. The SAA will launch services to Pointe Noire in the Congo from Jan. 26 and Beijing from Jan. 31.

Pointe Noire is the fourth new African destination this financial year. It joins Ndola, in Zambia; Kigali, in Rwanda; and Bujumbura, in Burundi.

African aviation industry must improve safety - IATA

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has called for a renewed focus on aviation safety to help Africa reap the benefits of aviation connectivity, as it expressed concern over the continent’s accident rate.

In 2005 Africa recorded nearly 10 hull losses per million flights with Western built jets. By 2008 that had been reduced to two. “That was still 2.5 times worse than the global average, but it was a significant step forward. In 2009, the rate jumped back to 9.94 and in 2010 it was 7.41. Two hull losses so far in 2011 put the rate at 4.33 against a global average of 0.37. The trend is once again in the right direction. And there have been no hull losses this year with IATA carriers. But aviation must be safe for all airlines and in all regions. And that means we have much work to do in Africa,” said IATA CEO and Director-General Tony TylerTyler, who was addressing airline CEOs, government leaders, policy makers and industry stakeholders at the African Airlines Association (AFRAA) AGM in Marrakech, Morocco.

“It is time again to muster the political will that we found in 2005 to improve safety. I have high expectations for the African Safety Summit’s two ambitious goals for 2015: to reduce Africa’s accident rate to the global average and to remove African carriers from the European list of banned airlines. IATA does not believe that banning carriers improves safety. Implementing global standards and best practices—as we do with the IATA Operational Safety Audit (IOSA)—delivers results. None-the-less, the list of banned airlines is a political reality that is not going to disappear. And improving safety is incumbent on all in this industry. So we need to work together,” said Tyler.

In May the European Commission announced that airlines from 15 African countries were banned from flying to the European Union (EU) due to safety concerns.

Runway excursions are the biggest safety challenge for Africa, IATA said. Working with the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a revised Runway Excursion Risk Reduction Toolkit was produced this year. “For the toolkit to improve safety, it needs to be used - by airlines, air navigation service providers (ANSPs) and airports,” said Tyler.

Tyler praised Nigerian Director General of Civil Aviation, Dr. Harold Demuren, who will complete his tenure in February 2012, for achievements in Nigeria. In 2005 it had the worst safety record on the continent with four of the eight hull losses in that year. Since 2007 Nigeria has had no hull losses. “Dr. Demuren’s leadership proved that world-class safety is possible in Africa. His work and many innovations should be an inspiration. Included among these, IOSA was made a requirement for long-haul operations from Nigeria. I urge other African governments to follow his example,” said Tyler.

IATA also called for a strong partnership to drive innovative solutions to the other challenges facing aviation in the region: security, environmental sustainability and infrastructure.

With COP-17 opening next week in Durban South Africa, Tyler repeated aviation’s commitment to environmental sustainability, through its targets of fuel efficiency improvements of 1.5% per year to 2020, carbon neutral growth from 2020, and a cut in net emissions of 50% by 2050 compared to 2005. He also noted the great opportunities for sustainable biofuels. “With the potential to reduce aviation’s carbon footprint by up to 80%, sustainable biofuels are an innovation that is a potential game changer. The challenge is commercialization. There is huge potential for Africa to develop local biofuels industries that could spread economic opportunities even in the most remote corner of the continent,” he said. Mozambique is already producing raw biofuel, which is being processed abroad and used by Lufthansa.

Regarding infrastructure, Tyler said the development of cost-effective infrastructure is crucial to the future health of African aviation. But infrastructure development fees are being imposed on airlines with little prior notification or consultation. The combined annual cost to airlines of three introduced since 2008 in Mali, Senegal and the DR Congo is over US$100 million, more than the African industry made in 2010. “Airlines and infrastructure providers share a common future. But we must safeguard and be guided by ICAO principles of non-discrimination, consultation, transparency, cost-relatedness and without pre-financing,” said Tyler.

African carriers posted a US$100 million profit in 2010. IATA expects the continent’s carriers to break even in 2011 and fall into losses of US$100 million in 2012. This is in line with a global trend of declining profitability in the face of global economic weakness.

“We must work together to ensure that every government in the continent understands aviation as an engine for sustainable development and a key pillar of economic strategy. Africa will benefit greatly by harnessing the power of a successful aviation industry. To ensure that aviation delivers on its potential, we must work together - industry and government - to ensure that aviation is safe secure, environmentally sustainable and well supported with efficient infrastructure,” said Tyler.

Airlines cancel flights to Addis Abba

Three airlines operating out of Entebbe International Airport to Ethiopia temporarily cancelled flights following the suspension of the use of the country’s airspace and that of Eritrea.

The affected airlines include; Ethiopian Airlines, Emirates, and Kenyan Airways which fly to Addis Abba. Ethiopia and Eritrea have suspended flights over their airspaces according to Mr Ignie Igundura, the spokesman of Uganda’s Civil Aviation Authority.

Volcanic eruption
The suspension came on the back of the ash cloud formed by the eruption of a volcanic mountain in Eritrea at the weekend.
The cloud which could cause airlines to crash due to poor visibility, spread from Eritrea to Sudan, Ethiopia, Djibouti and Egypt, according to the BBC.

Despite the cancellation of flights, Mr Igundura told Daily Monitor that business at Entebbe Airport had not been severely affected.

“We have flights like Emirates that have been affected. You can call them to find out what they are doing about it,” he said in an interview yesterday.

Mr Igundura was not sure of when the suspension would be lifted to allow airlines to resume flights to or over Ethiopia. “You cannot know because it’s a natural disaster. It’s difficult to tell,” he said.

Despite the disruption, airlines such as Brussels which do not fly over Ethiopia, continued with their flights to Europe.
“We haven’t been affected, our operations are going on smoothly,” Mr Roger Wamara, the sales and marketing manager Brussels Airlines in Uganda, said.

By last evening, Ethiopian Airlines had also resumed flights to Djibouti but not to other affected markets brining hope to some disturbed travellers.

“The volcanic ash cloud in the Northern part of Ethiopia is clearing.

Senegal Airlines announces new services to Central Africa

Dakar, Senegal - The new Senegalese airlines company, Senegal Airlines, on Tuesday announced the opening of new services to Cotonou (Benin), Libreville (Gabon) and Douala (Cameroon) from Dakar, with a technical stopover in Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire. A communiqué issued by Senegal Airlines said the opening of new stopovers is made possible by the arrival of a third Airbus A320, which will go into operation early July. According to the communiqué, the new flight schedule of the company is characterized by the reinforcement of the Dakar-Abidjan service, adding that the airline will propose 14 weekly non-stop flights between both capitals, with schedules adapted to the needs of the business clientele (daily departures from Dakar).

The opening of new direct services to depart Abidjan to Bamako and Cotonou: three times per week (Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday); to Libreville: two times per week (Wednesday, Sunday); to Douala: two times per week (Monday, Friday), it also announced.

Non-stop flights between Dakar and Ouagadougou: two times per week on Thursdays and Saturdays was also announced, in replacement of the flights operated hitherto via Bamako and non-stop flights between Dakar and Praia (Cape Verde): two times per week, on Fridays and Sundays.

Senegal Airlines will serve all these destinations with the assistance of its strategic partner, Emirates, for the transportation of the passengers to Dubai and beyond towards the Asian continent.

Iberia Offers Destinations in Africa and The Middle East

Iberia's customers can now book to new destinations in Africa and the Middle East. 

Since today, under code shares with British Airways, the Spanish airline is offering flights to Accra (Ghana), Lusaka (Zambia), Riyadh and Jeddah (Saudi Arabia). Meanwhile, British Airways has added its code to Iberia flights to Santiago de Chile, Guatemala and San Salvador.

The new code-sharing arrangements are a consequence of the merger of Iberia and British on January 24 of this year. Since then, more and more flights have both airlines’ codes. British Airways is placing its code in Iberia’s Latin American destinations, while Iberia is placing its code in British Airways flights to Africa, Asia and the Middle East. More destinations will be added to this code-share agreement in the coming months, so customers from both airlines will have access to a broader network.

 

Flights operated by each airline are progressively becoming available on the other's web site and telephone reservations lines. It is also possible in certain routes to combine fares of the two airlines, and to choose the most suitable. Other advantages to passengers include access to more than 120 VIP lounges in Airport s around the world.