Air France Plans Moderate Growth for Winter Season

In a difficult global economic environment impacted high oil prices, the Air France-KLM Group’s winter schedule posts moderate growth for the 2008-09 season, which starts on Oct. 26, 2008. The group’s overall capacity is up 1.7 percent in available seat-km compared with winter 2007-08.

This breaks down into –1.5 percent for the short- and medium-haul network and +2.6 percent on long-haul routes. In the rather unfavorable context where fuel purchases account for a very large part of costs, Air France is offering the same capacity as last year and has adjusted its schedule as closely as possible to the seasonality of the demand. In particular, more flights have been cancelled during the very slack periods.

Overall capacity remains stable with +0.1 percent of available seat-km compared with winter 2007-08, which breaks down into +1.0 percent on the long-haul network and –2.6 percent on the medium-haul network.

Seat capacity has increased to Mexico City and Buenos Aires with the entry into service of the B777-300ER, but it has decreased to Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo which will be partially operated with the A330-200 this winter.

After several seasons of very strong growth, capacity has stabilized in this very strategic area for Air France (down 1.8 percent). Available seat-km have increased by 2.2 percent on the Africa network with the addition of one weekly frequency to Kinshasa, Niamey and Ouagadougou, and the entry into service of a larger-capacity aircraft to Bangui.

The restructuring of services to Teheran with the suspension of flights from Paris has led to a 2.7 percent drop in capacity on the Middle Eastern network compared with winter 2007-08. KLM continues to serve Teheran out of Amsterdam with one extra flight, making a total of five weekly flights.

There are now more flights to Dubai (two daily) and Cairo (12 weekly flights). Excluding Teheran, the Middle East posts 6.1 percent growth. On Asian routes, capacity has grown by 1.4 percent this winter thanks to the introduction of the B777-300ER on the night flight to Hong Kong and the twice-daily service to Shanghai launched this summer.

Capacity remains stable on the Caribbean-Indian Ocean network. Capacity on medium-haul routes has dropped by 2.6 percent compared with winter 2007-08. This reflects the considerable adjustment of Air France capacity during periods where demand is flat, particularly between Christmas and the New Year and in January and early February.

All new features launched this summer will be maintained for the winter season, with increased frequencies on departure from Paris-CDG (Nantes: five daily; Pau: four daily; and Lyon: seven daily) and from Paris-Orly (Toulouse: 29 daily; and Biarritz: seven daily).