India maintains double-digit growth in air traffic for 36th straight month

India's domestic passenger traffic grew by 16 per cent in August, a global airline association said on Thursday.

"Indian airlines achieved a 36th consecutive month of double-digit traffic growth as demand rose 16 per cent," the International Air Transport Association (IATA) said in its global passenger traffic data.

"Traffic continues to be stimulated by sizeable increases in the number of domestic routes served."

India's domestic demand -- revenue passenger kilometres (RPK) -- was highest amongst major aviation markets like Australia, Brazil, China, Japan, Russia and the US.

The IATA data showed that India's domestic RPK -- which measures actual passenger traffic -- rose by 16 per cent in August compared to the corresponding month of the previous year.

India's domestic passenger traffic growth was followed by that of China at 10 per cent and Japan at 9 per cent.

In terms of capacity, India's domestic ASK -- which measures available passenger capacity -- edged higher by 15.1 per cent in August.

It was followed by China's ASK growth at 10.4 per cent and Russian Federation's at 8.4 per cent.

"Demand for domestic travel climbed 7.6 per cent in August compared to August 2016, on pace with the 7.5 per cent growth recorded in July," IATA said in its global passenger traffic data for August.

"Capacity rose 6.9 per cent and load factor increased 0.6 percentage points to 84.5 per cent. All markets reported demand increases with the exception of Australia," it added.

The international passenger demand for August climbed 7.2 per cent compared to the year-ago period.

In addition, the August capacity increased by 6.3 per cent, and load factor rose 0.7 per cent to 84.5 per cent.

"Following the strong summer traffic season in the Northern hemisphere, 2017 is on course to be another year of strong traffic growth. However, some important demand drivers are easing, particularly lower fares," said IATA's Director General and Chief Executive Officer Alexandre de Juniac.

"As we head towards the end of the year we still expect growth to continue, but potentially at a slower pace," he added.

--IANS

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