APA Issue 2, 2021
HOLDING PATTERN Association of Asia Pacific Airlines (AAPA) director general, Subhas Menon, praises the resiliency of the region’s airlines as the aviation industry awaits the smart, sustainable and safe restart of international travel.
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o the casual observer, the Asian aviation industry should be close to collapse after the unrelenting onslaught of bad news and misfortune in the past 14 months.
Whilst true on the face of it, the reality is that the industry’s deep-rooted resilience and determination have thus far allowed it to ride-out the COVID perfect storm, and start rebuilding for a restart when the pandemic recedes. Air travel has been shuttered indefinitely since March 2020 and yet almost all airlines, though battered, bruised and visibly grounded, are still around. A good thing they are, as their endeavours are keeping global supply chains ticking and playing a crucial role in the carriage of stranded residents, essential supplies and most importantly the vaccines so vital to our recovery from the pandemic. Unimpeded growth had taken Asian airlines to the forefront of the industry, but the past year’s decimation of air travel spiralled into a massive cash-burn and liquidity crunch, the likes of which has not been experienced in the past 50 years.
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Yet, airline leaders have avoided the spectacle of liquidations by raising private capital, receiving government support, cutting costs to the bone and flying more to transport goods, for which demand has sky-rocketed. This strong survival instinct, coupled with the efforts of AsiaPacific governments to keep the virus and fatalities in check, is cause for hope that air travel will turn the corner soon. The health crisis is still raging in many countries, and Asia-Pacific has not been spared from the periodic resurgence of COVID-19 cases. But, there is a growing sense that the region, which was the first to confront the virus, will soon embark on recovery, given its track record, for diffusing the worst of the virus. Control of the spread of the virus still seems to be the essential condition for the resumption of international air travel, whether it is achieved by strict controls or through mass vaccination. In the long run, everyone who can be vaccinated must be as a public health safety net. Governments will only allow
