Wednesday July 25, 2012

More flying into the country now, says Kong

PUTRAJAYA: Passenger traffic in Malaysian airports continues to increase this year.

The first six months of the year has yielded a 3.99% increase in passenger traffic, bringing the total of passengers served at airports to 33.18 million persons in that period.

The increase is reflected in both domestic and international flights, said Transport Minister Datuk Seri Kong Cho Ha.

“Of the 33,183,608 passengers who were served in our airports from January to June this year, 17.34 million were domestic passengers while 15.83 million were international passengers.

“The increase in passenger movement is due to a rise in air travel demands, increased flight frequency and the recommencement of operations by local and overseas airline companies at our airports,” Kong said in a statement yesterday.

The increase of passengers also showed that travellers were attracted to the peace and stability in Malaysia and that the country was not affected by the economic crisis in Europe, he added.

“To address the increasing presence of passengers, the Government has built KLIA 2, which is expected to have the ability to accommodate up to 45 million passengers per year when completed.

“The Government is also in the process of upgrading several airports, such as in Penang, Ipoh and Sibu, to provide more comfort to passengers,” Kong said.

Meanwhile, in a separate statement, the minister said Malaysian ports also saw a boost in container traffic.

The ports, he said, have handled some 10.34 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) containers, an increase of 4.9% from the same period in the previous year.

Trans-shipment handling also grew from 6.61 million TEUs to 6.93 million TEUs.

“Port Klang emerged as the busiest port in the first six months of the year with over five million TEUs handled at the port while the Tanjung Pelepas Port handled as many as 3.84 million TEUs.

“Port Klang was also successfully placed 13th in the world for its container port operations, a leap from its 2007 placing at number 16,” he said, adding that there were plans to develop a new port at Sarawak’s Saman Laju Industrial Zone.

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