Air passengers’ number drops as manpower export falls

In recent years due to massive manpower export fall since global financial meltdown Bangladesh’s main aerodrome Hazrat Shah Jalal Airport in Dhaka suffered a decline in the number of passengers, according to an official record.
Officials at the Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh (CAAB) say the decline in Bangladeshi workers travelling abroad had mainly caused the negative growth of air passengers although the number of flights to and from Dhaka had increased considerably.
Recruitment of Bangladeshi workers in Malaysia was suspended for sometime while the demand in the Gulf countries had gone down due to the global recession, CAAB sources said.
Bangladesh had sent some 500,000 workers abroad in 2009 compared to 800,000 in the previous year.
The number of flights to and from Dhaka has increased to 47,361 in 2009 from 46,078 in the previous year. But the passenger number fell by 1,25,630 during this period, said a CAAB report placed before the parliamentary standing committee on the ministry of civil aviation and tourism earlier this month.
The authorities, however, have no count on air passengers to and from Dhaka.
Over 4.25 million passengers were ferried on domestic and international routes in 2009 while the number was over 4.38 million in the previous year, marking a 2.87 per cent decline in the number of air travellers.
Cargo operations, however, showed a substantial growth of 1.46 per cent from the previous growth of 0.16 per cent in 2008. The civil aviation authorities say that the number of national and international flights increased in the recent years. Many of them are looking for new routes and are applying for raising their flight frequency.
But the record shows otherwise; at least eight of a total of 25 airlines licensed with CAAB for passenger transportation have kept suspended their operations for years.
They are Aeroflot, British Airways, Indian Airlines, Iran Air, Uzbekistan Airways, Al Italia, Slovak Air and UAE-based ARK Airways.
CAAB sources said, the number of passengers travelling to and from Dhaka was 4.16 million in 2007, a 5.33 per cent growth from 2006 when the number was nearly 3.28 million.
The CAAB recorded some 3.23 million passengers who travelled in 2005 while the number was 3.12 million in 2004.
Passenger number was 3.03 million in 2003 and 4.09 million in 2002. In 2001 and 2000 the number of passengers was 2.79 millions and 2.51 millions respectively.

Courtesy of Weekly Holiday