Incheon Airport Corporation Holds 'Airline CEO Meeting'... "Supporting Recovery of Air Travel Demand"

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[Asia Economy Reporter Yoo Hyun-seok] Incheon International Airport Corporation announced on the 26th that it held the ‘Corporation-National Airlines CEO Relay Meeting’ to discuss cooperation measures for the recovery of air travel demand.

The meeting was held three times between the 20th and 25th of this month. Kim Kyung-wook, President of Incheon International Airport Corporation, along with CEOs and executives from six national airlines including Korean Air, Asiana Airlines, Jeju Air, Jin Air, T’way Air, and Air Seoul participated. They discussed ▲airlines’ resumption plans ▲airport operation preparations ▲marketing support measures ▲future cooperation plans in anticipation of the recovery of air travel demand.

As the recovery trend of passenger demand becomes visible due to the government’s easing of entry quarantine and expansion of arrival slots, the corporation shared plans for phased normalization across all airport operations, including reopening major airport facilities and expanding airport infrastructure. Additionally, the corporation prepared various marketing support measures worth a total of 1 billion KRW to promote passenger travel sentiment recovery and airline route restoration. They requested airlines to actively utilize the marketing programs and work together for the early recovery of passenger demand.

Specifically, the Trip Booster program, a support measure for overseas travel sentiment recovery, will be implemented by selecting travel products in regions with high potential for early recovery of air travel demand and providing marketing cost support. Furthermore, the Network Rebooting program, a core route normalization promotion measure, will support marketing costs for routes that achieve the highest flight recovery rate among key routes by region. The plan is to support the resumption of airline routes and supply expansion in preparation for the summer peak season.

Each airline agreed to actively cooperate in resuming international flights by utilizing the corporation’s marketing support measures. They also decided to strengthen their cooperative relationship through regular meetings between the corporation and airline executives and enhance joint marketing execution capabilities. Moreover, the corporation and airlines reached a consensus on the need for additional regulatory easing for timely demand recovery, such as simplifying quarantine procedures, expanding slots, and lifting flight curfews.

In particular, they recognized that easing the entry PCR test, which significantly increases passengers’ cost and psychological burden during overseas travel, is essential for restoring passenger travel sentiment. They plan to continue consultations with the government and related agencies to ease quarantine measures, such as switching the current entry PCR test to rapid antigen tests or selectively conducting tests only for symptomatic individuals and arrivals from high-risk areas.

Kim Kyung-wook, President of Incheon International Airport Corporation, said, “With daily passengers at Incheon Airport recently exceeding 20,000 and air travel demand increasing, I hope this meeting will help lay the foundation for early recovery of air travel demand.” He added, “Going forward, the corporation will secure a competitive edge in the post-COVID-19 global hub airport competition by establishing a close cooperative system with national airlines.”

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