Central Asia Sees Upside from Russia's Closed Airspace

25.08.2023 - 14:03 / skift.com

Central Asian airlines are seizing opportunities from Russia’s closed airspace, with airline traffic into the region booming in the year since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, executives and analysts said.

Flights in and out of the region have surged as airlines that previously flew over Russia are now passing through or flying over central Asia to get to Asia and the Middle East. New airlines, bolstered by government support, have also popped up to capitalise on the new traffic.

“A lot of people have moved from the conflict area into Central Asia…they have the linguistic affinity so we’re seeing more flights into this area and we’re seeing more dynamic economies,” said Raphael Haddad, the head of JetCraft Commercial, a firm that sells aircraft globally and in the region.

Since the early days of the war, Russian airspace has been closed to dozens of Western countries.

As a result, flights between many European countries and Uzbekistan have risen 105.9 percent since 2019 and 36 percent since January of 2022, according to Eurocontrol data.

Kazakhstan’s Aviation Administration says passengers are up 16.5 percent year-on-year, while Kazakhstan’s Air Astana announced 2022 as its best year ever with after-tax profit at $78.4 million.

In Uzbekistan, authorities have helped launch a new airline called Silk Avia and another called Air Samarkand, hoping to capitalise on the increase in traffic.

Neither airline responded to a Reuters request for comment.

“The startups, some of them are supported by local governments or local businessmen that have seen an opportunity to enter a market which is becoming a more dynamic,” Haddad said.

The shift comes as European airlines struggle to figure out new routes into Asia since the closure of Russian airspace, while Russian airlines grapple with challenges in serving their local travellers still keen to go on holidays abroad.

Aeroflot had been trying to become a major transit line between European capitals and Asian countries via Moscow, including Thailand, China and Japan, since the mid-2010s along with competitors such as British Airways, Lufthansa, Turkish Airlines and Emirates.

It carried 3.6 million people on Europe-Asia routes in 2016 and had planned further expansion.

Now, they’re even more hampered in achieving that goal as they struggle to operate as usual.

“The Russian airlines themselves are severely constrained in what they can do because of equipment shortages, they can’t maintain the aircraft to sufficient standards,” said James Halstead, an aviation analyst and managing partner at Aviation Strategy.

“They still have demand from those who want to go on holiday, they have links into the “stans”. This is an opportunity for those like Air Astana to operate routes