The end of the covid restrictions in the spring of this year caused a strong rebound in mobility, tourism and air business. But expectations of a quick recovery have cooled as the year has progressed. What is happening at the airports? The employers' association for the sector in Europe, ACI Europe, has published a downward forecast for passenger traffic on Tuesday. According to it, passenger volumes in 2023 will fall 9% below pre-pandemic levels (2019). In addition, it has delayed full recovery until 2025 instead of 2024 as it stated in its last forecast, from May of this year.
Olivier Jankovec, Director General of ACI Europe, says that passenger traffic "has had a strong recovery since last spring and has so far been resilient to geopolitical and economic issues."
However, they now expect the recovery in passenger traffic to slow its growth and not reach pre-covid activity levels until 2025. "Next year we will still lose 220 million passengers compared to 2019, which means our volumes will only match the levels of 2017”, he adds.
The continuing geopolitical tensions and the war in Ukraine will continue to affect several national markets, explains the employer. Deteriorating macroeconomics and inflationary pressures will also affect demand, as airfares rose sharply during the third and fourth quarters of 20221. Eurocontrol estimates that, without taking inflation into account, air ticket prices in Europe They are up 10% since August.
To this they add the increase in taxes on the air business, environmental taxes and the lack of supply from some airlines. Most companies are still working with a capacity lower than that of three years ago. Only Ryanair and Wizz Air have increased their offer in Europe, Eurocontrol highlights.
However, ACI Europe expects that these negative factors will be partly offset by the demand for leisure and family travel, as well as the expansion of ultra-low cost airlines. "The end of the airport slot exemption granted to airlines from next summer should also ease supply pressures," says the European airports association.
As a result of this situation, the gap between airports will widen, considers ACI. The large infrastructures dedicated to tourism, such as Barajas, El Prat, Charles de Gaulle or Amsterdam, will maintain or even increase their business. Secondary airports will have it more difficult, he predicts.
