Putin instructed to prepare a plan for the development of air transportation in the Far East

President Vladimir Putin instructed the government to prepare a plan for the development of air transportation in the Far East by March 1, 2024. He announced this on September 12 during a speech at the plenary session of the EEF 2023 in Vladivostok.

According to the head of state, this plan will have to cover the construction of new and modernization of existing airports, improving standards for the operation of small aviation, the supply of domestic aircraft and helicopters, as well as increasing the availability of air travel – primarily by reducing airlines’ costs for leasing aircraft.

The exact parameters and targets have yet to be determined, but it would be right to set the bar so that by 2030, passenger traffic on domestic flights in the Far East will increase to at least 4 million people a year, the president added. Putin did not name the current volume of passenger air traffic in the region.

Prior to this, in August, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin instructed the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Transport to provide subsidies in the amount of 1.76 billion rubles in the budget for the next three years. annually for air transportation within the Far Eastern Federal District (FEFD) on socially significant routes.

The single Far Eastern airline Aurora receives separate federal subsidies. It has been allocated 5.9 billion rubles for passenger transportation within the Far Eastern Federal District in 2023.

In total, the list of socially significant routes in the Far Eastern Federal District, transportation along which is subsidized in 2023, includes 37 directions. For each of them, a maximum transportation tariff is established.

Separately, the Prime Minister instructed the Ministry of Industry and Trade, the Ministry of Transport, the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Eastern Development, together with other interested organizations, to submit proposals by September 25 to reduce the cost of aircraft production, reduce leasing payments and the possibility of reducing airport fees for socially important transportation in the Far East.

According to preliminary data from the Federal Air Transport Agency, domestic airlines transported 70.8 million people in January-August 2023, which is 12% more than the same period last year. In total, as the Ministry of Transport expects, 101 million air passengers will be transported in 2023 compared to 95 million a year earlier.

At the same time, the cost of an economy class flight per 1,000 km of travel in July reached its maximum in the last four years and amounted to 7,639 rubles, according to Rosstat data. For comparison: in July 2022, this figure was at the level of 6,621 rubles.

Demand for transportation arises from the growth of business activity and the development of tourism, notes Ilya Shatilin, editor-in-chief of Frequentflyers.ru. You can flood the region with subsidies and fly for the sake of flying, but in the Far Eastern Federal District the problem is not only the small population and its low density, but also the large proportion of specific airfields – unpaved, with short runways, and so on, the expert continues. According to him, now transportation there is mainly provided by An-24 aircraft and helicopters, and there is nothing to replace them yet.