West Asia aircraft orders may surge nine-fold this year

19 September 2007

New commercial aircraft orders from West Asian countries, also known as the Middle East, may see a nine-fold surge this year. This is because of increased demand from the region's leading carriers, which are struggling to cope with an exceptional growth in air traffic.

Last year, the two global commercial aviation giants - Boeing and Airbus - bagged orders for 60 aircraft from West Asia alone.

This year, the region's burgeoning aviation sector combined with its overall economic buoyancy may see new aircraft orders exceed 500, industry sources estimate.

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) says the rapidly increasing new orders have to be seen in the background of an improvement in operating profits of airlines.
However, the industry still has to recover from net losses in 2005 and 2006. IATA says a major factors driving the sharp increase in new orders are the rapid growth of Asian markets, the expansion of the Low Cost Carrier (LCC) sector and high fuel costs increasing replacement demand.

An Airbus Middle East representative said the European aircraft maker has so far won firm orders for 200 aircraft and expects to add another 100 before the end of the year. This will be 10 times the orders Airbus got in 2006, when it won 30 of a total of 80 orders from the Middle East and Africa regions.

This year, Airbus has booked a total of 713 orders worldwide, while Boeing has won 841 orders till the end of August. In 2006, orders for commercial aircraft totalled 1,834, down slightly from 2005, but still the second highest total in history. Emirates Airlines is the world's biggest customer for the Airbus A380 superjumbo, with 45 A380 aircraft on order. It will begin to take delivery of the aircraft next year.