Aviation 18
Daily Times Nigeria Tuesday, October 27, 2015
Boeing seeks to establish plant in Nigeria The United States of America, USA, Boeing Aircraft Manufacturing Company has unveiled plans to expand its business activities in Africa. Boeing through its President, Boeing International, Marc Allen recently wrote the past Director-General of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority, NCAA, Dr. Harold Demuren and seek an audience with him on how its business could be propelled forward in the continent. The letter dated 19th October, 2015, and signed by its Managing Director, Africa, Miguel Santos declared that Boeing has decided to undertake a fact finding mission to Africa with stops in four major Sub-Sahara Africa cities including Lagos, Nigeria. Allen stated that the company intended to in each city meet with political, business leaders and hear, first hand, their views on the political and economic prospects of the continent in which it felt the former helmsman of the regulatory agency would be useful to it to achieve its set goals not just in the country, but in the continent as a whole. The letter added, “I believe that your views are critical for us to have an objective and clear understanding of where Africa is today and where it is heading. “Allen will be accompanied by Mr. Stanley Roth, Vice President Boeing International, Ms. Heather Pederson, Senior Director, Government Affairs, both based in Washington DC and myself.” Santos said that Boeing aircraft manufacturing company has had a presence throughout the African continent for several years, through its commercial airplanes and the African airlines that operate them, stressing that Africa was undergoing a geo-political and economic transformation that would position the continent for the rest of the 21st century.
Allen
L-R Chairman,League of Airports and Aviation Correspondents,Chukwuemeke Iwelunmo.Permanent Secretary Mins of Aviation Hajia Binta Bello. MD of NAMA Ibrahim Abdulsalam. Director, Training and operation NCAA, Capt Sidi Abdullahi and former Chairman House Committee on Aviation Hon Awaal Tukur.
Ethiopian Airlines make profit than all African carriers combined Stories by Chukwuemeke Iwelunmo
Ethiopian Airlines’ $175 million profit for the 2014/15 fiscal year it announced at the end of last week is more than what the rest of Africa’s airline industry posted over the same period. Tewolde Gebremariam, Ethiopian Airlines chief executive, said the airline, which has been
the most profitable in Africa for a couple of years now, exceeded its revenue and profit targets for the fiscal year. “We had planned for 43 billion birr by 2015, but in the last fiscal year closed at about 49.4 billion birr in revenue. The same with profitability’ The state-owned carrier said it plans to increased it fleet to 140 planes by 2025 when it expects to be generating over $10
billion on annual revenue. At the moment it has 76 planes and recently announced plans to increase this by 60 percent by buying 44 new aircrafts. While other major African airlines, including Kenya Airways and South African Airways, fall deeper into loses, Ethiopian Airlines has grown its revenue and expanded its routes to become the most networked carrier on the con-
tinent. Collectively, Other African Airlines are expected to post a profit of barely $100 million the lowest of all regions, according to the International Air Transport Industry Association (Iata). They are also expected to see the slowest growth among developing markets with capacity and demand expansion of 3.3 percent and 3.2 percent respectively.
Foreign, domestic airlines generate N10bn in 6 months As haven for air transport investment, a total of 15 countries have so far indicated their preparedness to sign Bilateral Air Services Agreement (BASA) with Nigeria. When concluded, these carriers can begin reciprocal air transport services between Nigeria and these nations. Also, 13 others are on the threshold waiting for renegotiation of their existing air pacts. The disclosure was made by the Director General of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Capt. Muhtar Usman at a media seminar. Usman put the amount of tickets sold on the domestic route from January to July this year at
N2, 352, 011,595.17, with international airlines raking N8, 176, 919, 415.10 within the same period. He revealed that the total volume of passengers airlifted from January to July 2015 by domestic operators stand at 6, 061, 740 passengers while their foreign counterpart freighted 2, 341, 748 in similar period. He noted that this result would have been better but for the transition period and elections which always restricts wide scale travel, adding that the aviation regulatory body is putting finishing touches to the process leading to the registration of all aviation marketers. To him, the existing one would
have to regularize their operations while new entrants he said are expected to file fresh application with the same requirements. Meanwhile, Nigeria is preparing for another Universal Safety Audit Oversight Audit Programme (USOAP), March 2016. In the last International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) safety audit, Nigeria scored 96.45 per cent. Besides, the American Transport Security Administration (TSA) and European Union (EU) security experts have at various times scrutinized the nation’s security systems and have excelled with minimal open items. His words, “As a matter of fact,
NCAA is the only civil aviation authority in the world that has four ICAO certified auditors on its staff list. These auditors are now being invited by ICAO to join other experts to carry out audits on other countries. One of them has just returned from an audit exercise in Tanzania and Mali”. “The country is at the concluding phase of our Corrective Action Plan (CAP) from the last security audit. Infractions and security breaches have become farfetched, as the synergy and commitment among our security agents at our airports is very encouraging. This has led to a stabilized industry”.