Development
How RwandAir Found a Niche Despite a Turbulent 20 By Edwin Ashimwe
2020 WAS A disastrous year for airlines, and RwandAir, the national carrier was no exception. Towards the end of the year, the International Travellers board a RwandAir plane at Kigali International Airport in 2020. Photo: F Air Transport Association (IATA) announced full-year global passenger traffic results restrictions are imposed in the face of new variant for 2020 showing that demand (revenue passenger Omicron. kilometres) fell by 65.9% compared to the previous Optimism lies in vaccination uptake year. According to experts, governments are urged Also contracted by 35.7% was the capacity while to work with industry to develop the standards for load factor dropped 17 percentage points to 66.6%. vaccination, testing, and validation which would The global outlook is by far the sharpest traffic lead to a prompt and orderly restoration in global decline in aviation history. Furthermore, domestic air travel. demand in 2020 was down 48.8%compared to The IATA Travel Pass will help this process, 2019. by providing passengers with an App to easily Much as Rwanda doesn’t have a large domestic and securely manage their travel in line with any market, the national carrier entered the cargo space government requirements for Covid-19 testing or to help compensate for the losses in passenger vaccine information. revenue. In February 2021 RwandAir partnered with IATA Similarly, operating flights from Asia to the Middle for the trial of the pass. East, then onwards to Europe during the pandemic, The travel pass, at the time was described as it was able to prove that it was up to the role most a digital platform that will help passengers easily often identified with large international premium and securely verify that they comply with Covid-19 carriers. test or vaccine travel requirements, in turn giving Like last year, however, the airline is experiencing governments the confidence to reopen borders. a dramatic start of 2022 as more severe travel 40
January-February 2022
DAWN
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