Saudia targets post-pandemic profitability, privatization

Saudia targets post-pandemic profitability, privatization

The aviation industry has certainly had its challenges. In February, the regional president of the International Air Transport Association (IATA) told Argaam that airlines in Saudi Arabia incurred $9.6 billion in losses as passenger traffic fell by 70 percent.The latest figures released by IATA earlier this month showed that for Middle Eastern airlines, demand in February 2021 was down 83.1 percent compared to the same month in 2019.Flights were grounded in the Kingdom in March 2020. While domestic traffic resumed at the end of May last year, and Saudia is gearing up for international flights to restart on May 17, AlKoshy said it will still be some time before a recovery to pre-pandemic levels."Our estimates are pretty much in line with IATA and other airlines because we're sharing data on market recovery,“ he added."We don't see that full recovery taking place in international (passenger traffic) until 2024. The remainder of 2021, we do see a strong domestic (and) slight improvement in international “¦ It seems people are still a bit cautious about long-distance traveling.“A survey in December found that 46 percent of Saudi respondents are looking forward to traveling internationally once restrictions are lifted.Saudia is putting everything in place to