Dubai to cut aviation charges
dubai — The Dubai Civil Aviation Authority (DCAA), which oversees all aviation-related activities in the emirate, is considering reducing fees for its services as part of the government’s initiative to make the emirate more competitive and grow its aviation business, a senior government official said on Monday.
Speaking on the sidelines of the Airport Show, Nasser Mubarak Al Khater, head of aviation business affairs and consumer protection at the air transport department at DCAA, said the fee reduction is currently under discussion.
“Based on instructions from higher authorities, we are discussing the best possible way for fee reduction for the aviation business such as issuance of licences and no objection certificates to our customers and stakeholders with regard to aviation activities such as aircraft manufacturing, aircraft parts manufacturing and trading in spare parts,” Al Khater said.
Last week, Dr Mohammed Alzarooni, vice-chairman and CEO of the Dubai Silicon Oasis Authority and director-general of Dubai Airport Free Zone Authority, told Khaleej Times that the 2 free zones — DSOA and Dafza — are also mulling cutting fees to attract more foreign companies as part of the Dubai government initiative to make the emirate more competitive and investor-friendly. These initiatives will also help improve the emirate’s rating in the ease-of-doing business rankings.
Al Khater said the DCAA has deployed Artificial Intelligence (AI), which has substantially reduced the time required to obtain its services.
“We have reduced the time for a number of services following the implementation of AI. We now issue no objection certificates to our customers within 15 minutes compared to 3 days earlier. Overall, using AI has reduced the time spent on each permission from 1 day to half an hour and it is much more advanced when compared to international standards,” he added.
Internationally, it takes from 2 days up to 1 month to get landing rights. Currently, the DCAA offers landing rights in 15 minutes to chartered airlines when they request to land at any of the airports in Dubai, he said.
“We started with the landing services and hopefully in the near future, AI will be implemented across the board for all our services,” he added.