Fujairah International Airport Leading Airport in Fujairah

Early results for global passenger traffic show continued growth in March 2008, again fuelled by a very substantial increase of over 7 percent in international traffic as compared to March 2007. How do you assess the global transport industry?

The UAE specifically and the Middle East in general has more growth than international growth which is announced by IATA. The international growth as we know is 7 percent, while the growth in the UAE is 25 percent. That’s due to the many developments, such as the real estate developments, the industry of tourism, and other industry developments in the UAE. Therefore, the number of flights which are handled even in the UAE airports totals to 1,450 flights per day. Each month it is increasing and decreasing. Out of that, 48 percent goes to Dubai airport and the rest is distributed to other airports such as Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, Fujairah, Ras Al Khaimah, and Al Ain. Therefore, the growth in the UAE, as I said, is higher than others in the Middle East and even the world, according to IATA 7 percent. If we compare the UAE to the Middle East, the UAE has a market share of about 40 percent currently of total volume of the traffic in the Middle East. This number will increase, I think, and will reach 60 percent very near in the future once we have the development of the new Jebel Ali airport as well as the development of the new Abu Dhabi airport, and finishing expansions of other airports in the region such as Fujairah airport. So I can say we are ahead of the growth, and this growth will be more, as long as we have more real estate projects. The UAE has become a destination for many people from Europe, from America, and from other regions, therefore I think the growth will continue to be more and more than the normal standard of IRTA which is 7 percent.

How does Fujairah International Airport compare to these numbers?

In terms of growth or just aircraft movement, if we compare the latest statistics from January to April 2008 compared to 2007, we have 65 percent growth of aircraft movement. Keep in mind that we do have a national carrier, such as Dubai Airport has Emirates Airline, Abu Dhabi has Etihad, Sharjah has Air Arabia and Ras Al Khaimah has RAK Airways. So if you even take the national carriers from the statistics of these airports, we can see that Fujairah has the highest growth. At the same time, with cargo we do have growth of about 25 percent. For passenger we are not happy with the growth, we had expected more, and that is due to not having a national carrier. However, there are some discussions right now with private companies to start low-cost flights or airlines in Fujairah, within distances of a 4.5 hours flight, which could be between Fujairah and the Indian sub-continent, the Far East, and other parts of the world within that time limit. Therefore, I think that number will be three digits, it will not be just 5 percent, it will be over 100 percent. But that won’t be within the very near future; it will be within two or three years. For other operations, in terms of cargo and aircraft movement, as I said, we have excellent growth, and I expect that growth will continue.

How do you compare Fujairah Airport to Dubai Airport; what are the specifics of the airport and the region?

There is no comparison between the airports in the region. Usually I compare the six airports in the UAE to having a pizza; you have many slices, and that is the market share in the UAE. Therefore, the development even and the growth in the Dubai airport does help and affect in a positive manner the rest of the airports in the region. The more marketing and growth that comes to Dubai airport, which is the leading airport not only in the UAE but in the Middle East, the more flights we receive. I would like to say thanks to them for their marketing and promotions which we do receive. We are contributing to each other, we are helping each other; we even have an association called Gulf Airport Handling Services. We meet three to four times a year where we discuss mutual benefits between the airports, and we help each other in terms of spare parts, negotiation with the companies, and helping each other. By the end of the day, whatever is generated in Dubai Airport or Fujairah or Abu Dhabi or the rest of the airports contributes to the federal government as a budget. Therefore, all the people who are living in the UAE, locals or non-locals, they do benefit from that as well. So we contribute and help each other. We do have very healthy competition between us, there is no problem, but at the same time, we should keep in mind that the healthy competition increases services and quality as well as the safety and security of the airports. This is why when we look at the airports in the Middle East and this part of the world compared to the airports in the UAE, we see that the airports in the UAE are well advanced in terms of equipment and so on. They are adopting new technologies more than any other airport in the region; therefore, the airlines have choices of services as well as competitive rates. This is why we do have growth; this is why we have 1450 flights per day in the UAE.

Cargo accounts for 80% of traffic at Fujairah International Airport, which currently handles over 40 to 60 flights per day and around 100,000 passengers a year, largely from the Indian Subcontinent and the CIS countries. What have been some of the new developments over the past 6 months?

We have developed a new tarmac for aircraft parking, and that one is designated for maintenance facilities. About two months ago we signed an agreement with a French company to open an aircraft maintenance facility at the airport, which they will be able to maintain the Airbus 320 or the 737 with, which would be convenient for four aircrafts. Actually, it was supposed to be two, but I had a meeting with the GM last night and they decided to make it for four because they are anticipating a huge demand for maintenance. Therefore, I think the tarmac we create will help this company as well as the existing companies that are handling Russian and Western aircraft. We finished that one and right now we are extending the existing passenger tarmac because sometimes we get no space for any additional ones. In the last three or four months we even diverted some flights to other airports, and sometimes when we count the number of aircraft in the airport for such a small airport like Fujairah, we get about 91 aircraft at the same time, and we fail to get any additional parking space for any new flights. This might be positive and negative; positive because it means we are doing a good job compared to periods before where there used to be only one flight per week or even day. But negatively, we are losing revenue, so we are trying to catch up with the growth that we are facing and hopefully we will have enough space for the additional parking.

What are your real projections for 2008 and 2009? By how much would you like to expand?

Going to the second question, the 65 percent growth so far from January to April for 2008 indicates that we’re going to have big growth in terms of aircraft movement as well as cargo. Therefore, hopefully we will not be out of space for additional parking, and I think it will be good growth. There is a lot of growth, due to the reasons I mentioned in question one.

You are handling thousands of people entering and leaving through the airport. This is their first experience. You are the flagship representing Fujairah. What is your major responsibility in promoting and developing Fujairah?

We do contribute to and help the emirate of Fujairah as an airport to provide good services to the travelers. When travelers come to any country, the first thing is their impression of that airport. And as travelers, like you and I are, usually you remember the airport of the city you are flying to; you remember the services, even how the counters looked, you remember all these things. This is why we try to do our best through our marketing department, through our quality control department, to enhance the services at the airport – not only for the passengers, but for all users: airlines companies, cargo companies, forwarders, maintenance companies. We need to make every user happy and at the same time, we are coordinating with the hotels in Fujairah as well as Fujairah Tourism Bureau. We do participate in the exhibitions and conferences that are related to tourism so we can help the government of Fujairah to help the Tourism Bureau to bring passengers to Fujairah instead of using other airports. And I think that the emirate of Fujairah will be in a better position after one and half years, and my reason for saying that right now is that there will be a new highway that is already being constructed, it started about one year ago, and has about one and half years left, and that will help Fujairah to be very close to the commercial capital of the UAE which is Dubai as well as Abu Dhabi, the capital of the UAE. The distance will be reduced from 150 km to only 77 km. Driving time will be only 35 to 40 minutes. That will help us to be in a better position and to market the airport. I think it will be faster for people to come to Fujairah rather than getting lost in the traffic in some other cities of the UAE.

The Fujairah International Airport has been chosen as the Best Airport for Cargo handling, in the 100,000 tone category for the year 2007. What does this award mean to you?

The award means a lot of things. For me, when I received the award it’s like I received my doctorate degree. It even means more than that. We work as a team. Five years ago we decided to put Fujairah airport on the globe of cargo worldwide. We participated in most of the cargo exhibitions, cargo conferences, and we tried to attract target customers of cargo operators, forwarders, etc. The result came after five years and we were very lucky. As you mentioned earlier, we have 80 to 90 percent of the cargo movement, and have been selected from among 40 airports worldwide. The selection was based on the safety, security, customer satisfaction, the quality of the services provided to the clients in terms of cargo, timing of the cargo, loading, all of these measures that have been used. We have up to 100,000 tons of cargo worldwide. It is easy to gain an award, but the most important thing is to keep the services. An award can be put on a shelf, but to keep the services is the most important thing. This is why we are now creating additional departments for safety and for service quality. Service quality used to be part of Marketing; now it’s a totally different department, and we are hiring very qualified people in order to run these departments. Hopefully the services will be better and better. After the award we received another award from a handling company as the best suppliers of services, called Hadeel International, and we have been selected from among three hundred airports that this company deals with. This company deals with handling, landing permissions, and services, and we have been selected as the best. So this is another award we are proud of, and hopefully we will have more and more, depending on the services we provide to our clients.

At the global Aviation and Environment Summit held on the 22 of April in Geneva, commercial aviation industry leaders signed a declaration on climate change to lead towards carbon neutral growth and a totally sustainable industry. What strategies is Fujairah Airport adopting to cope with increasing environmental concerns?

I was in Warsaw about one month ago, and I was invited to be a speaker at the Green Airports Panel. It was a good experience for me. Our intention right now is to reduce the usage of oil and diesel at the airport, and have most of our ground-handling equipment be operated by electricity. I think it is not too early now in the UAE for these things; we have a new generation, the environment has become an important issue, and therefore, we should not only look at the benefits and the growth of the airport, we should look at the environment too. Part of the quality control is the environment. We are taking care of this and are looking to have our airport be a green airport, but that is going to take a few months or years.

How do you picture the company in 5 years? What is your personal vision?

I think in five years we are going to have one or two private airlines running flights connecting Fujairah to other airports in the region. The growth of the cargo will be 4 to 5 times. Regarding passengers, I would like to return to that question again; in five years, it is my expectation that we will be able to handle one million passengers. That is not impossible as long as we start the additional airlines or get private companies to start their business in Fujairah. In five years, aircraft movement will reach 300 flights per day. This is my expectation if everything goes well. I don’t think it’s impossible because we can see from the history of the last five years of growth of UAE aviation. I think one reason for success is having conferences like the one we are participating in now, and exhibitions, where people can come from all different countries and regions to discuss technology and airport equipment, etc. I think that is very good for success. There will be good competition, but at the same time this is helpful. The growth of any airport or the development of any airport in the UAE does help the other airports. I always believe there is a share for all airports in the UAE, and the pizza will not finish; there will be more and more slices.

To finalize the interview, do you have a final message for our audience, our viewers and readers about Fujairah?

I would like to invite them to Fujairah in particular and the UAE in general. The UAE is a very safe country. We try, as locals of the UAE, to treat people as nationals or citizens of the UAE. There is no discrimination, regardless of religion, race, color, or whatever. We are all humans and we try to help each other to live in peace. Thank God, this is one of the reasons why UAE is developing. Fujairah is a very attractive place, we have very beautiful mountains beside the sea, and there are very nice four and five star hotels, so I think having a weekend or a week in Fujairah will be a very good experience, and hopefully it will be through Fujairah airport one day.

Thank you.

My pleasure.