Emirates states economic case for Indian expansion
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Emirates contributes more than US$848 million annually to India’s GDP, supports in excess of 86,000 Indian jobs and generates almost US$1.7 billion in foreign exchange earnings, a new report has revealed.
The study, which was released by the National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) in New Delhi on Friday, was intended to emphasise the importance of the Dubai-based airline to the Indian economy, and support the case of its future expansion in the country.
India is expected to become the third-largest aviation market by 2020, and Emirates wants to expand its capacity entitlements in the country to capitalise on this growth.
“Emirates has been committed to India since we started operations in 1985. In the past 30 years, we have progressively grown our services to India by increasing capacity and opening new routes. Today we operate 183 weekly flights to nine points across India, offering our customers in India seamless connections to more than 140 destinations, and also facilitating inbound visitors from across our global network into India,” stated Adnan Kazim, Emirates’ divisional senior vice president of strategic planning, revenue optimisation & aeropolitical affairs.
“The NCAER study underlines the importance of air transport and its role as an economic driver in India. Aviation facilitates trade and tourism, and creates employment in many different industries. Emirates’ annual operations alone support more than 86,000 jobs across India and contribute US$848m to the economy. We are confident that with increased capacity, we can contribute even more to India’s economic growth and development by opening new conduits for trade and investment, through our growing worldwide network.”
Dr Saurabh Bandyopadhyay of the NCAER said that offering Emirates more seats in India would have a “multiplier effect on output and job-creation”.
In February 2014, India and the UAE negotiated the first expansion of seat entitlements since 2008, giving Dubai-based carriers an additional 11,000 week seats on Indian routes. The NCAER study forecasts that if Emirates were to operate an additional 4,500 weekly seats between India and Dubai, an additional 4,800 jobs would be created and foreign exchange earnings would rise to US$1.8bn with the arrival of almost 40,000 more tourists a year.
And an additional 13,849 seats per week would support 100,405 jobs a year, contribute US$987.8m towards GDP and boost foreign exchange earnings to US$2bn per year.
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