Lopsided growth

Russian airlines carried a total of 56,950 passengers last year, a 26.2% increase on recession-stricken 2009. Passenger traffic saw an even more impressive growth at 30.8%, reaching 147 billion revenue passenger kilometers. According to the Russian Air Transport Operators Association (AEVT), “Russian air carriers [in 2010] reached the 1992 level for passengers carried and fell only slightly short of the 1991 level for passenger traffic”.
The country’s traditional five largest carriers further strengthened their positions in 2010, together transporting 52% of all air passengers. Their combined annual increase in the number of passengers flown reached 6 million people, including 4 million on international routes. The top-five lineup remained unchanged from 2009: Aeroflot came first, followed by Transaero, S7 Airlines, UTair, and Rossiya Airlines (see p. 18).

AEVT reports that international passenger numbers have been growing at a faster pace than those on domestic routes: “Over the past five years the share [of international passengers in the total air passengers carried] has grown by 3.2 percentage points. Russian airports in 2010 handled 27.7 million international passengers, which is 21.2% up on 2008 and 30.3% up on 2009. The charter market showed signs of revival, with the number of charter passengers growing by almost 23%.”