As per the forecast by the International Air Transport Association (IATA), India will become the third largest aviation market in the world displacing the UK by 2026.
About IATA :
The International Air Transport Association is a trade association of the world’s airlines. Consisting of 268 airlines, primarily major carriers, representing 117 countries, the IATA’s member airlines account for carrying approximately 83% of total Available Seat Kilometers air traffic. IATA supports airline activity and helps formulate industry policy and standards. It is headquartered in Montreal, Canada with Executive Offices in Geneva, Switzerland.
- IATA was formed in April 1945 in Havana, Cuba. It is the successor to the International Air Traffic Association, which was formed in 1919 at The Hague, Netherlands. At its founding, IATA consisted of 57 airlines from 31 countries. Much of IATA’s early work was technical and it provided input to the newly created International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), which was reflected in the annexes of the Chicago Convention, the international treaty that still governs the conduct of international air transport today.
- The Chicago Convention couldn’t resolve the issue of who flies where, however, and this has resulted in the thousands of bilateral air transport agreements in existence today. The benchmark standard for the early bilaterals was the 1946 United States-United Kingdom Bermuda Agreement.
- IATA was also charged by the governments with setting a coherent fare structure that avoided cut-throat competition but also looked after the interests of the consumer. The first Traffic Conference was held in 1947in Rio de Janeiro and reached unanimous agreement on some 400 resolutions.
- Aviation grew rapidly over the following decades and IATA’s work duly expanded. It transformed its trade association activities to take account of the new dynamics in aviation, which was seeing increasing demand from the leisure sector. Price flexibility became increasingly important and the United States led the way into deregulation in 1978.
- IATA has cemented its position as the voice of the aviation industry in recent years, launching a number of important programs and lobbying governments in the wake of successive crises. Despite its factual influence, the IATA is a trade group with no legislative powers.
- IATA provides consulting and training services in many areas crucial to aviation.
- Travel Agent accreditation is available for travel professionals. Full accreditation allows agents to sell tickets on behalf of all IATA member airlines.
- Cargo Agent accreditation is a similar program.
- IATA also runs the Billing and Settlement Plan, which is a $300 billion-plus financial system that looks after airline money.
- And it provides a number of business intelligence publications and services.
- Training covers all aspects of aviation and ranges from beginner courses through to senior management courses.
- IATA manages the Ticket Tax Box Service (TTBS), a database of taxes for airlines.
About the Forecast,
It is expected to be the source of more than half the new passengers over the next 20 years. China will displace the US as the world’s largest aviation market around 2029. India will displace the UK for third place in 2026, while Indonesia enters the top ten at the expense of Italy.
- India’s passenger traffic will touch 442 million by 2035 and growth will also increasingly be driven within developing markets. Over the past decade the developing world’s share of total passenger traffic has risen from 24% to nearly 40%, and this trend is set to continue.
- India’s air passenger traffic to grow to 442 million by 2035 with 322 million new air travellers, amid the domestic aviation market growing by over 20 per cent for more than a year now.
- India will be among the five fastest-increasing markets, after China and the US, in terms of additional passengers per year over the forecast period with 322 million new passengers among the total of 442 million flyers during the period (2035).
- The number of passengers flown by the Indian airlines stood at 81.09 million in the January-December period last year, a jump of 20.34 per cent from 67.38 million they had flown in 2014 on the back of lower fuel prices and heavily discounted airfares offered by the domestic carriers during the period.
It is noted that Over the past decade the developing world’s share of total passenger traffic has risen from 24 per cent to nearly 40 per cent, and this trend is set to continue.