Robert J. Aaronson, Director General of Airports Council International, has unveiled ACI’s most recent forecasts…
Robert J. Aaronson, Director General of Airports Council International, has unveiled ACI’s most recent forecasts which show global airport passenger growth at over 4 percent per year through 2020 to some 7 billion persons, and freight forecasts of 5.1 percent per year, hitting some 170 million tons in 2020.
Aaronson delivered the keynote speech at the Airfinance Journal/ACI Forecasting Conference in Vienna on February 8. Despite the optimistic forecasts, he stressed that “sufficient airport capacity is a precondition for achieving the forecast growth.”
Aaronson pointed out airport operators spent more on new capacity in 2004 than in any previous year, but that “political, regulatory, and environmental hurdles are likely to stifle infrastructure development at many congested hubs.” A new feature of the forecasts, a scenario which assumes capacity constraints could limit airport infrastructure development, showed that growth could be restrained by a full percentage point annually over the next 15 years.
Aaronson commented: “It is time for airport operators and their industry partners to come together to reinforce the urgent need for national and multi-national regulators to remove obstacles to airport development.”
The results of the forecasts are summarized in the chart below.
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