The closure of borders during the Covid-19 crisis caused a 90% drop in “passenger” air traffic in April 2020. The decline in trade led to a 30% drop in air cargo volume over the same period. While some continents are gradually recovering from this global downturn and are now returning to pre-Covid traffic levels, this is not the case for Africa, which faces several challenges. However, several opportunities present themselves on the continent to allow it to take off again.
There is generally a correlation between the level of development of a country and air transport. Indeed, a 1% increase in GDP would typically lead to a 1.3% increase in air traffic. The latter is often considered a catalyst and an indicator of economic development. The stronger a country’s economic growth, the more air traffic will be boosted and reversed. However, this relationship needs to be qualified in the case of Africa. Indeed, since 2002, GDP growth has been more dynamic than the world average, but air traffic is not increasing at the same speed. It seems to be held back by a number of brakes that prevent its full development.
In 2022, passenger volume (RPK) globally was at 2/3 of the level seen in 2019, when it was barely half for Africa. This slower recovery in traffic is explained by several factors: firstly a lower vaccination rate than on other continents, then varied access conditions depending on the country, finally an often incomplete vaccination schedule for passengers, as many elements that reduce and complicate travel options. And impacts have been felt differently at different airports, with an average 60.2% drop in air traffic across Africa’s top five airports between 2019 and 2020. Not to mention the little help from governments in comparison with other continents.
That said, despite the multiple obstacles it faces, the development potential of air transport in Africa remains significant.
The illustration of this fact is that first of all, Africa today occupies the first rank in the transport of goods by air, a rank which can be justified by the increase in the world demand for freight, and in particular by the constant growth in volumes on the Africa-Asia route. Indeed, with the aim of limiting the disruption of supply chains weakened by the health crisis and the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, suppliers now tend to favor air transport (delivery times made more reliable and more responsive agility). Africa thus recorded a growth in cargo traffic of 33.9% in 2021, compared to 7.7% for the rest of the world.
With the desire of airlines to expand their catalog of destinations, the number of connections between France and Africa increased by 18% between 2019 and 2021 (53 in 2021 against 45 in 2019). If in the past the exploitable routes mainly concerned those with North Africa, the long closure of Algeria has accelerated the development of new routes (for example, Paris-Dakar entered the top 5 of France-Africa routes).
However, Africa is significantly more dependent on intercontinental traffic than other regions. It represents 40% of traffic compared to 16% for Europe and 10% for North America. This reflects a long-haul air offer that remains very connected to major hubs.
We find this dependence on intracontinental traffic, where the main hubs in Europe and the Middle East remain obligatory points of passage for one passenger out of four travelers within the content. The development of point-to-point traffic within the continent is therefore an opportunity to free ourselves from these hubs and boost the recovery of air traffic in Africa.
To democratize intercontinental traffic, the opening of the skies seems essential. A few states are already members of the Single African Air Transport Market aimed at lifting some restrictions to enable connectivity on the continent. However, too few countries have adopted it to date: nearly 40% of countries on the continent are not members of SAATM. Greater participation is needed for this initiative to have a real impact.
The recent arrival of the A220-300 and the A321-XLR, two airliners designed by Airbus with a capacity of 3,400 nautical miles (NM) respectively (the equivalent of a direct London-Douala flight) and 4,700 NM (the equivalent of a direct Nairobi-Abuja flight), could make it possible to increase the profitability of certain lines, little used until now. Thus, these new generation aircraft could obtain multiple advantages. Thus the reduction in operating costs, the improvement of the quality of the roads, in particular from an environmental point of view, the increase in traffic, induced by the induction of demand, and the democratization of point to point in Africa.
In view of all these findings, it appears that the health crisis has had a real destructive effect on the aviation sector, from which the African continent is struggling to recover. Africa is gradually catching its breath, but still faces many challenges: decreasing costs, land development, decreasing protectionist tendencies in view of the sector’s recovery and reducing dependence on hubs. Thus, African airports could be part of this component of changes by focusing their development on a logic of frequency and controlled costs, using tools allowing them to make quality traffic projections at local and global level, to assess the costs or to study the opportunities for creating new routes.
* The three authors are from BearingPoint. Jean-Michel Huet is associate, Tristan Thiebaut, mission director, and Marion Couzon, senior consultant.
