A hockey stick recovery?

Here’s what three industry heavyweights have to say about
recovery of the aviation sector, and the factors that are hindering
and helping it.

Alexandre de Juniac, Director General & CEO, IATA

If the opening is slow, the recovery will be slow. Implementation of safety measures must be universal and quick. Quarantine measures are an enormous issue; it is very discouraging for air travel. It is useless to implement quarantine if you systematically implement the measures given by International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). We are advocating serious and strong procedures to avoid quarantine. We are also working with insurance companies to put together insurance policies that can be made available to passengers in case of infections.

Paul Griffiths, CEO, Dubai Airports

JI don’t think there is enough reliable data to draw any extrapolations to where we are going to end up. I wonder if we will go back to carrying a digital version of the yellow book I remember carrying, which was my immunisation record and allowed me to enter certain countries because it was proof that I had been immunised against yellow fever, polio, etc. If we could get a digital version of that, we could certify that we are fit to fly and are not any virus-positive.

Peter Harbison,Chairman Emeritus, CAPA – Centre for Aviation

The CAPA projections may change depending on where the infection goes and what the response of the authorities is in terms of opening up borders. What is also slowing growth is the totally uncoordinated closure of borders and their quarantine protocols. There is almost no bilateral discussion on this except maybe within the EU. It is going to be a major issue in terms of opening up international markets. We don’t have any higher authority or leadership in terms of co-ordinating the opening up of air services.