African Airlines Report 9.5% Traffic Growth in May

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) announced global passenger traffic results for May showing that demand (measured in revenue passenger kilometers, or RPKs) rose 4.6%, compared to the same month in 2015, which was the same level achieved in April. Capacity climbed 5.5%, which pushed the average load factor down 0.7 percentage points to 78.7%. Demand for domestic traffic rose 5.1%, outpacing international demand growth of 4.3%.

“After a very strong start to the year, demand growth is slipping back toward more historic levels. A combination of factors are likely behind this more moderated pace of demand growth. These include continuing terrorist activity and the fragile state of the global economy. Neither bode well for travel demand. And the shocks of Istanbul and the economic fallout of the Brexit vote make it difficult to see an early uptick,” said Tony Tyler, IATA’s Director General and CEO.

May 2016 (% year-on-year)	World share¹	RPK	ASK	PLF (%-pt)²	PLF (level)³
Total Market	100.0%	4.6%	5.5%	-0.7%	78.7%
Africa	2.2%	8.6%	9.4%	-0.5%	65.7%
Asia Pacific	31.5%	6.6%	6.9%	-0.2%	76.9%
Europe	26.7%	2.0%	2.8%	-0.6%	80.2%
Latin America	5.4%	1.7%	1.3%	0.3%	79.4%
Middle East	9.4%	11.2%	15.4%	-2.7%	72.1%
North America	24.7%	3.0%	3.4%	-0.3%	83.8%