Mr Manongi |
The
number of international airlines serving Tanzania has increased by almost 200
per cent to 49 in the last nine years, resulting in more economic activity.
The
TCAA Director General, Mr Fadhili Manongi, attributed the trend to the
country’s air transport safety standard, which is above the average and high
quality ground services offered.
“The economic growth of over 6.0 per cent for
the consecutive six years spurs the aviation sector’s expansion,” Mr Manongi
told the ‘Daily News’ during a tour of TSN offices over the weekend.
The
number of international passengers also increased to 593,073 last year, from
312,312 during the previous year.
The total number, including domestic
passengers, jumped up to 3.86 million last year, from 2.17 million in 2005.
On
the domestic arena, the regulator said the number of licensing air operators
also doubled from 38 in 2005 to 67 last year, while 54 of those holding
licences are operating.
Mr
Manongi said during the period TCCA revenue increased by 75 per cent thus
enabling the authority to become self-reliant by 100 per cent.
However, the
sector faces a number of challenges that include rapid technological changes in
aviation forcing the authority to incur extra costs to purchase equipment and
training staff.
“The
geography of our country needs five air navigation radars instead of the
current one, which has been working in the last ten years,” Mr Manongi said.
He
said the authority was not satisfied with the airport infrastructure which
hinder domestic airlines to utilise fully aircraft capacity thus increase the
cost of doing business to elevate fares.
Source: The Daily News, www.dailynews.co.tz, reported by Abduel Elinaza in Dar es Salaam
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