MAHB 2021 passenger movements in Malaysia and Turkey showed resilience and were above the expected targets estimated. Passenger movements recorded high volume towards the last quarter of 2021, surpassing 5-million mark for the first time since the first travel restrictions were enforced from March 2020.
A like-for-like comparison from April to December 2021 over the same corresponding period in 2020 shows traffic grew by 43% or an additional 9 million passengers to 36.1 million for the year. The introduction of the Langkawi travel bubble in September with relaxed travel rules proved that passengers have regained confidence to travel by air.
Top 5 international destinations recorded in 2021 were Singapore, Dubai, Jakarta, Doha and Dhaka. As for 4Q21, passenger movements for Europe, Middle East, South Asia, Southeast Asia, and Southwest Pacific regions recorded between 20% to 200% growth over the same period.
There were 51 airlines operating in 2021 to 57 international and 31 domestic destinations compared to 78 airlines to 144 international and 34 domestic destinations in 2019. Overall average load factor in 2021 recorded 51.6%, with a higher average load factor for the last quarter of 2021 (4Q21) at 60.8%. December 2021 registered the highest average load factor for the year at 63.4%. Istanbul SGIA traffic rebound was more apparent within a year after WHO declared the COVID19 outbreak as a global pandemic. Travel restrictions were lifted gradually from the end of the
first quarter in 2021, in anticipation of the peak summer season and the high vaccination rates.
Istanbul SGIA was also recognised as one of the fastest-growing airports in the above 25 million passenger’s category and ranked eight busiest airports based on passenger movements performance by ACI Europe in September 2021.
Despite the ongoing uncertainties due to the new emergence of variants of concern, MAHB is cautiously optimistic in forecasting gradual traffic recovery in 2022. The Malaysia Aviation Commission’s Waypoint Report issued in December 2021 forecasted passenger movements for 2022 to reach between 32.6million to 49 million or 30% to 45% of 2019 passenger movements driven predominantly by flights to domestic and ASEAN markets.
The temporary flight suspension of VTL flights, Umrah trips, travel restrictions from selected Africa countries, and temporary flight restrictions are some of the approaches taken by the Malaysian and Turkish governments respectively in response to the emerging Omicron variant. MAHB is closely monitoring the developments of the VOC, booster vaccines efficacy and travel restrictions to traffic recovery.
