IATA to PNoy: PHL needs real airport hub in Manila

Published September 27, 2012 2:25pm

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) on Wednesday said the Philippines needs an airport hub in Manila – not in Clark, Pampanga, which is far from the capital – to be on a par with its more competitive Southeast Asian neighbors.

"It’s time for change," IATA director general and CEO Tony Tyler told reporters in a briefing.

The IATA official, who is on his first official visit to the Philippines, is scheduled to meet President Benigno Aquino III in Malacañang Wednesday.

He will discuss with Aquino importance of building a new airport hub in the capital – as a priority – because building secondary airports and splitting air traffic between Manila and Clark will not be enough, Tyler said.

The Philippines ranks 112 out of 139 countries in terms of quality of air transport infrastructure, according to the World Economic Forum's Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index. Other Asian countries that ranked lower than the Philippines were Nepal, Mongolia, and Bangladesh.

In his assessment of Philippine aviation industry, Tyler noted it was neglected by successive administrations that led to a bad reputation for the country when it comes to air safety, inadequate airport capacity, and high taxation.

In 2008, the US Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) International Aviation Safety Assessment Program placed the Philippines on the Category 2 list because of deficiencies identified under the Universal Safety Oversight Audit program of the International Civil Aviation Organization.

According to the FAA website:

The FAA has established two ratings for the status of countries at the time of the assessment: does comply with ICAO standards, and does not comply with ICAO standards.

They are defined as follows:

Category 1, Does Comply with ICAO Standards: A country's civil aviation authority has been assessed by FAA inspectors and has been found to license and oversee air carriers in accordance with ICAO aviation safety standards.

Category 2, Does Not Comply with ICAO Standards: The Federal Aviation Administration assessed this country's civil aviation authority (CAA) and determined that it does not provide safety oversight of its air carrier operators in accordance with the minimum safety oversight standards established by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

Because of the category downgrade, Philippine carriers were banned from the European Union since 2010.

IATA believes the EU ban is not the correct way of goading the Philippine to improve overall air safety standards. At the same time it has acknowledged the lack of confidence in the safety oversight capabilities of the Philippines.

As a consequence, the airlines had to suffer even if the ban was related to government oversight capabilities, according to IATA.

"I will be urging the President to personally intervene to sort this out," Tyler said, noting, "IATA certainly stands ready and willing to help."

He said IATA is not into producing banned lists or ranking. "Our focus is on raising the bar on safety.

“One of our main safety programs is the IATA Operational Safety Audit (IOSA). It is a condition of IATA membership," Tyler added.

In the case of flag carrier Philippines Airlines (PAL) – Asia’s first airline – IATA noted PAL has met IOSA’s 900+ standards and has been on the IOSA registry since 2006, which means that PAL is operating at the highest standards of global best practices in operational safety management.

"[But] PAL is not able to expand its operations to the US… and it cannot fly to Europe… and – along with the rest of the Philippine air transport industry – it is tarnished with the stigma that comes with being on these two lists," Tyler said.

"And I would argue that the stigma extends to the tourism industry,” the IATA official said. “China and Japan are among the main source markets for tourism to the Philippines. Both are very sensitive to safety issues,” he added.

According to it website, IATA is an international trade body, created over 60 years ago by a group of airlines. Today, IATA represents some 240 airlines comprising 84 percent of total air traffic. — VS, GMA News

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