France recorded an exceptional growth in passengers’ traffic to Asia

PARIS- While French air transport grew modestly last year by 2.5% to reach an annual ouput of 136 million passengers last year, Asia was the bright star in air passengers growth. According to data released by the DGAC (Direction General de l’Aviation Civile or General Directorate of Civil Aviation), total passengers from and to Asia Pacific passed in 2013 for the first time the ten-million mark. Asia Pacific total number of passengers reached 10.4 million, up by 6.9%. At this rhythm, passengers’ flows with Asia Pacific are likely to take over passengers’ traffic to and from the Americas before the end of the decade. In 2013, passengers’ traffic with America grew by only 2.2% to reach 12 million. Asia Pacific represents 7.6% of all passengers. However, France includes into the counting West Asia (Middle East). 
 

In details, the busiest markets in 2013 were China and Japan. China-France generated a traffic of 2.2 million passengers, up by 5.2% while Japan sent 1.2 million passengers to and from France, up by only 1%. Between 2012 and 2014, many new destinations were or will be added from France to Asia, such as Tokyo Haneda Airport, Jakarta or Wuhan. Increased frequencies are offered this summer to Singapore and to Kuala Lumpur served by Air France since last year in direct competition with Malaysia Airlines.  
 

Air France offers 15 destinations in Asia from Paris while a total of 20 airlines link France to 25 Asian destinations during the summer 2014. In total capacities, Air France is the largest carrier to Asia with 149,000 available seats per month (April 2014), followed by All Nippon Airways with 19,500 available seats followed by both Air India and Japan Airlines, which both offer 15,500 seats per month. 
 

TABLE- Top passengers traffic by countries in 2012 between France and Asia (excluding the Middle East)

China	1,376,706	14.9%
Japan	1,140,154	14.2%
Hong Kong	620,164	-6.5%
India	551,584	-8.9%
South Korea	478,526	4.1%
Singapore	475,781	3.3%
Thaïland	421,762	-3.5%
Vietnam	362,180	9.4%
Malaysia	196,219	-22.4%
Taiwan	98,426	5.5%