Airport fees for future facilities unfair, says IATA chief

Support for air passengers in India protesting against airport development fees has come from what could be an unlikely quarter – the organisation that monitors the global aviation industry.

Support for air passengers in India protesting against airport development fees has come from what could be an unlikely quarter – the organisation that monitors the global aviation industry.

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The International Air Transport Association’s (IATA) director-general Giovanni Bisignani says it is “unfair” to charge airport development fees from passengers for facilities that would come up only a few years later.

Speaking to Hindustan Times on the sidelines of the 65th annual general meeting of IATA held at Kuala Lumpur earlier this month,Bisignani said “It is unfair to ask passengers to pay airport development fees for something that will come in the future. The fee is being levied without consultations with the industry.”

New airports that have come up in Hyderabad and Bangalore charge Rs 300 from every domestic passenger and Rs 1,000 from every passenger flying out of India.

At the Delhi airport a domestic passenger is charged Rs 200 and Rs 1,300 is levied from passengers flying out of India, while in Mumbai a domestic passenger is charged Rs 100 while an international passenger is charged Rs 600.

The IATA official is obviously upset over factors that hurt his industry.

“The Asia-Pacific region was the star of the world in the last two years now it has become the biggest loss maker. Of the $10 billion losses that the industry is likely to incur world over the Asia-Pacific region would have cumulative losses to the tune of $ 3.3 billion.”

Bisignani said there was an urgent need to appoint an effective airport regulator and also a need for the government to intervene to streamline the tax structure on aviation turbine fuel.