The International Air Transport Association, the Geneva-based trade association representing over 230 international/global airlines, has said low vaccination rate is slowing down airline passenger traffic in Nigeria and other African countries.
IATA disclosed this in a report titled, ‘Air Passenger Numbers to Recover in 2024,’ released on Tuesday.
It added that passenger traffic levels across Africa would grow to 76 per cent of 2019 levels in 2022 before surpassing pre-crisis levels by 2025.
It said, “Africa’s passenger traffic prospects are somewhat weaker in the near-term, due to slow progress in vaccinating the population, and the impact of the crisis on developing economies.
“Passenger numbers to/from/within Africa will recover more gradually than in other regions, reaching 76 per cent of 2019 levels in 2022, surpassing pre-crisis levels only in 2025 (101 per cent).”
According to the association, it expects the total number of travelers to reach four billion in 2024, exceeding pre-COVID-19 levels to grow to 103 per cent of 2019 levels.
It added that expectations for the shape of the near-term recovery have shifted slightly as a result of the evolution of government-imposed travel restrictions in some markets.
The IATA’s Director-General, Willie Walsh, was quoted as saying, “The trajectory for the recovery in passenger numbers from COVID-19 was not changed by the Omicron variant.”
Article first published on the Punch Website
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