Air passenger traffic, worldwide, continued its strong recovery in June, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) has reported. IATA is the global representative body for the airline industry.  

In year-on-year (y-o-y) terms, total air passenger traffic in June was up 31%, reaching 94.2% of the levels achieved before the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic. For the first half of this year, passenger traffic was 47.2% higher, y-o-y. International passenger traffic in June rose 33.7%, y-o-y, with strong growth reported in all markets, reaching 88.2% of pre-Covid levels. For the first semester of this year, international traffic was 58.6% greater, in comparison to the same period last year. Domestic passenger figures in June were 27.2% higher, y-o-y, and were actually 5.1% above the numbers for June 2019 (that is, before Covid). For the first half of this year, domestic passenger traffic was up 58.6%, y-o-y.

“The northern summer travel season got off to a strong start in June with double-digit demand growth and average load factors topping 84%,” highlighted IATA director-general Willie Walsh. “Planes are full which is good news for airlines, local economies, and travel- and tourism-dependent jobs. All benefit from the industry’s ongoing recovery.”

Regarding IATA’s regions, that with the lowest y-o-y growth rate in June, North America, still recorded double-digit growth: 12.9%. Next came Europe, with 13%, then Latin America (18.7%) and the Middle East (28.3%). Africa recorded the second highest growth rate, of 31.8%, but top place went to the Asia-Pacific, with 90.1%.

In terms of international air passenger traffic, the Asia-Pacific again saw the highest y-o-y increase in June, at 128.1%, and Africa was again in second place, at 34.7%. Then followed the Middle East (29.2%), Latin America (25.8%), North America (23.3%) and finally Europe (14%). Regarding international capacity, in June, for the Asia-Pacific, this rose 115.6% y-o-y, for Africa it was up 44.8%, for the Middle East the increase was 25.9%, for Latin America it was 25%, for North America, 19.5%, and for Europe, 12.6%. International load factors increased by 4.6 percentage points in the Asia-Pacific, to 82.9%; by 2.7 percentage points in North America, to 90.2%; by 2.0 percentage points in the Middle East, to 79.8%; by 1.1 percentage points in Europe, to 87.8%; and by 0.6 percentage points in Latin America, to 84.8%. The load factors in Africa actually fell by 5.1 percentage points, to 68.1%, the lowest load factor across all the regions.

The domestic air passenger markets routinely reported on by IATA were Australia, Brazil, China, India, Japan and the US. Of these, China recorded the greatest y-o-y jump in June: 129.6%. Then came Japan, at 33.8%, India (14.8%), Brazil (13.3%) and the US (8.0%). Australia actually recorded a y-o-y decline of 1.7%. India’s figure for June was 1.3% higher than that reported in June 2019, before the pandemic.

“As strong as travel demand has been, arguably it could be even stronger,” asserted Walsh. “Demand is outrunning capacity growth. Well-documented problems in the aviation supply chain mean that many airlines have not taken delivery of all the new, more environmentally friendly aircraft they had expected, while numerous aircraft are parked awaiting critical spare parts. And, for the fleet that is in service, some air navigation service providers are failing to deliver the requisite capacity and resilience to meet travel demand.”