Cape Town – The Western Cape’s tourism and hospitality continues to record an impressive recovery.
Domestic two-way passengers passing through Cape Town International Airport reached 507 787 in February 2023, a recovery of 72% compared to February 2019.
Finance and Economic Opportunities MEC Mireille Wenger said in February 2023, Cape Town recorded a total of 101 444 tourist arrivals via air, of which 92% originated from overseas markets and 8% from the African continent.
The UK was the top source market to Cape Town via air, closely followed by Germany, USA, Netherlands, and France.
"Looking back on our tourism performance in February of this year, I am thrilled to confirm that international two-way passengers through Cape Town International Airport reached 258 970 in February 2023, representing a full recovery when compared to 2019, reaching 100%,” said Wenger.
Meanwhile, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) also announced continued strong growth in air travel demand, based on February 2023 traffic data.
"Despite the uncertain economic signals, demand for air travel continues to be strong across the globe and particularly in the Asia-Pacific region. The industry is now just about 15% below 2019 levels of demand and that gap is narrowing each month,” said Willie Walsh, IATA’s director-general.
African airlines’ traffic rose 90.7% in February 2023 compared to a year ago. February capacity was up 61.7% and load factor climbed 11.4 percentage points to 75.0%.
“People are flying in ever greater numbers. With the Easter and Passover holidays, we are expecting large numbers of travellers to take to the skies in many parts of the world. They should do so with confidence that airlines have been rebuilding resiliency that it suffered owing to the pandemic.
“Other participants in the air travel value chain, including airports, air navigation service providers, and airport security staff, need to have the same commitment to ensuring our customers can enjoy smooth holiday travel,” said Walsh.
Cape Times