AIRPORTS Company South Africa (Acsa) and the government will focus on markets in the East to attract more international traffic to Durban’s newly-opened King Shaka International Airport.

Acsa managing director Monhla Hlahla at the weekend said the company was prioritising the East as studies showed that this was where future growth would come from.

“Even at the time when they were privatising Acsa, studies always showed that future growth would come from Asia. This was before China became big and it is beginning to show more now. Even if you talk to the airlines, they tell you that Africa is number one and Asia is number two,” Hlahla said.

Hlahla said Acsa would use the World Cup as an opportunity to market the new airport to secure as many new routes as possible. Last week, Acsa met the Beijing Airport Authority and SAA about routes between South Africa and China.

The KwaZulu-Natal government is negotiating with Jet Airways because it wants the airline to launch a direct flight between Durban and Mumbai. The Indian airline already flies from OR Tambo International Airport to Mumbai.

Emirates is the only international airline that is currently using the King Shaka airport. The R7.2 billion facility, which is housed together with the Dube Tradeport 35km outside Durban, can accommodate 7.5 million passengers a year.

President Jacob Zuma, who officially launched the airport at the weekend, added that the government’s trade strategy prioritised greater integration with countries of the South. He said the new airport and the trade hub were well positioned to capture these markets.

Since it started operating at the beginning of the month, King Shaka has seen more than 15 000 passengers come through its gates on more than 700 flights.

Hlahla said the facility had been delivered with precision and excellence by the 8 000 workers who built it from scratch over a period of 33 months. Besides ensuring that there was enough traffic coming through the airport, Hlahla highlighted two other challenges that she said still had to be addressed.

“It is about the sale of the land (the site of the old Durban International Airport). I run a small business compared with government and I need them to finalise the sale of the land so I can put the money back into the business and I can afford to pay my debts,” said Hlahla.

“The other issue is that many people don’t realise how much the aviation industry contributes to growth. We need government policy to create an enabling environment for the industry to grow and to be sustainable. I am referring to a number of things like the regulatory environment.”

Acsa is unhappy with the way that its tariffs are determined and it has approached the courts as it wants to change the regulatory structure.

Transport Minister Sbu Ndebele said the old Durban International Airport site would be used to park planes during the World Cup. The government would call for expressions of interest from the public after the tournament to source development ideas.

Zuma revived the idea of building a new international airport in Durban 16 years ago when he was MEC for economic development and tourism in KwaZulu-Natal. The plan had been opposed under the apartheid government.

“There has never been any doubt in my mind that this airport was the missing piece of the puzzle to enable growth and development in this region and for our country. More than 80 percent of our national economy is housed in the three cities of Johannesburg, Cape Town and Durban,” Zuma said.

“Durban, however, was the only city that lacked the aviation infrastructure that was able to accommodate long-haul international flights,” the president added.