Lufthansa Group expands Windhoek-Frankfurt operations
DUBAI - The Lufthansa Group’s new leisure airline, Eurowings Discover, has increased flights between Frankfurt and Windhoek from five to seven as a year- round service, effective 27 March 2022.
A further increase to 10 weekly flights is also scheduled from July to mid-September this year, which includes the travel option for local travellers between Windhoek and Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe.
Director of Transportation Policy and Regulation in the Ministry of Works and Transport, Cedric Limbo, said at the recentlyheld Namibia Investment Summit in Dubai, United Arab Emirates that representatives from the Federal Republic of Germany and those of Namibia met on 15 and 16 March 2022 to discuss the various aspects of the existing bilateral air service agreement (BASA).
Before an airline can operate international services in another country, the government must first negotiate a treaty level agreement with the destination. The decision, he said, will open future development prospects for the air carriers, and indeed the transport sector serving Namibia.
Limbo added that the new revised position will address the aspect of connectivity from Namibia to the rest of the world for leisure and business travel.
The move is anticipated to have a positive impact on Namibia’s tourism and business sectors, and could potentially create a substantial number of jobs in key areas. “Namibia will also formally be part of the Single Africa Air Transport Market (SAATM) after Namibia’s ambassador to Ethiopia Emilie Ndinelao Mkusa signed the SAATM memorandum of implementation on 31 January this year,” he stated.
SAATM is a flagship project of the African Union’s Agenda 2063 to create a single unified air transport market in Africa, liberalise civil aviation, and drive the continent’s economic integration agenda.
Speaking at the same event, Lufthansa Group General Manager for Southern Africa and East Africa, Dr Andre Schultz, said the Frankfurt-Windhoek route out of the global network of Eurowings Discover has been one of the best-performing.
He expressed gratitude to fruitful discussions between the two governments for them to increase their footprint, and for Namibia as a destination to have more access and more connectivity to the key source markets beyond Germany into Europe through the Lufthansa Group.