Ethiopian to add seven new destinations

Ethiopian Airlines is set to add even more cargo capacity to African trade lanes with the launch of services to seven new destinations in the first five months of the year.

The Addis Ababa hubbed airline announced that between January and June it will launch new services to Victoria Falls (Zimbabwe), Antananarivo (Madagascar), Conakry (Guinea), Oslo (Norway), Chengdu (China), Jakarta (Indonesia) and Singapore. The airline aims to offer services to 120 international destinations by 2025. With these new additions, it will offer flights to 98 cities with its fleet of Boeing 777, Airbus A350, B787 and Bombardier Q-400 aircraft.

Tewolde GebreMariam, Chief Executive, Ethiopian Airlines, said, “Africa’s share of the global aviation is the smallest which is only around three per cent. We are highly concerned on the low base of air connectivity in the continent.”

African carriers currently have weaker cargo load factors than any other region. In November, IATA statistics showed that cargo load factors declined year on year for the 19th consecutive month to reach 25.3 per cent - the lowest level of any region monitored by the airline organisation. The reason for the decline in load factors is capacity additions rather than weak demand. In November, last year African carriers recorded a 10.9 per cent improvement in freight tonne km demand terms compared with 2015 levels, but this was outstripped by a 26.9 per cent increase in capacity.