Air passenger traffic continues strong growth trajectory; records 20 pct increase: ICRA

Credit rating agency ICRA on Wednesday said that the December 2016 air passenger traffic in the country stood at 24.3 million, exhibiting a substantial growth of 20 percent over December 2015.

The report further added that during FY2017, the passenger traffic has reported a y-o-y growth of 19 percent, aircraft traffic has grown by 15 percent and cargo traffic has grown by nine percent.

"The passenger growth in December has been primarily driven by significant y-o-y increase in domestic traffic, which constitutes 77 percent of the passenger traffic in the country and has reported a 24 percent y-o-y growth in December 2016 as against 22 percent growth in November 2016," said vice president and sector head for corporate ratings ICRA, Harsh Jagnani.

The international passenger traffic growth has remained relatively stable at eight percent in December 2016. In line with increase in passenger traffic, the aircraft traffic growth has also reported pickup in growth, increasing by 17 percent y-o-y in December 2016 as against 14 percent in November 2016.

The passenger growth in the country has remained broad-based with 19 out of the top 20 airports exhibiting double-digit y-o-y growth rates. The growth remained robust across both metro cities (y-o-y growth of 19 percent) and non-metro cities (y-o-y growth of 22 percent).

In another positive, the air cargo traffic recovered and reported m-o-m growth of five percent in December 2016, after declining by 12 percent in November 2016. On y-o-y basis as well, the cargo traffic growth picked up to 11 percent in December 2016 from seven percent in November 2016.

"The improvement in cargo traffic has been led by the recovery in domestic cargo volumes in December 2016, after bearing the impact of slowdown in economic activities in the country following demonetisation in November 2016," added Jagnani.

The domestic cargo traffic reported a y-o-y growth of eight percent in December 2016 as against decline of four percent in November 2016. On m-o-m basis as well, domestic cargo traffic reported a 10 percent growth in December 2016, after declining by 20 percent in November 2016.

International cargo traffic, which constitutes 62 percent of the overall cargo traffic in the country, also witnessed an increase, reporting a y-o-y growth of 13 percent and m-o-m growth of three percent in December 2016.

The growth remained well-spread with 17 out of the top 20 airports reporting positive y-o-y growth in December 2016.