Shortage of air seats hits revival of Nepal’s tourism

30 April, 2007

Just as the tourism business in Nepal has been picking up after the conflict between the government and the Maoist extremists ended recently, it is facing another obstacle – shortage of air seats.

For a majority of tourists from abroad, visiting the scenic Nepal has become a difficult task since most of the airlines flying to Nepal are packed.

Those in the tourism business complain that the dearth of air seats is impeding the recovery of Nepal’s tourism sector, which was once flourishing.

According to The Kathmandu Post newspaper, Qatar Airways, which operates 11 flights a week on the Doha-Kathmandu route, says it is packed until June 2007.

Most flights of Gulf Air, which has seven flights every week to Kathmandu from Bahrain, are packed until December 2007.

As for Thai Airways, almost 95% of its seats in its outbound flights to Bangkok are booked till May 2007. The pressure of demand for air seats is heavy, but there is no way to deal with it, an official of Thai Airways was quoted by the daily as saying.

The situation in the New Delhi-Kathmandu route is no better. An official of the Jet Airways said the airline’s flights are almost packed.

What is worse, Nepal may soon be totally cut off from Europe in terms of direct air connectivity as Austrian Air, the only airline running direct flights from Vienna, will be discontinuing its flights from May 17, 2007.

Varini De Silva, president of Ceylon Express International, a United States-based travel company, says the shortage of air seats has hindered the company’s efforts to send more tourists to Nepal.

Ram Kaji Koney, vice-president of Nepal Association of Tour and Travel Agents, says many tour operatives have given up promoting Nepal owing to the scarcity of air seats. According to him, Nepal has become a virtually inaccessible destination. Many tourists planning to make trips to Nepal have given up their plan because of non-availability of air seats.

Nepal, adds Ram Kaji Koney, has become an expensive destination, which has discouraged tourists. The round-trip airfare from Kathmandu to London is around 90,000 Nepali rupees (about 1,285 US dollars), while the two-way fare on the New Delhi-London route is around 42,000 rupees ($ 600).

In recent months, some airlines had started flights to Nepal but they were not sufficient to cope with the demand caused by the rising number of tourists.

Tourist arrivals grew by 32% to reach 82,857 in the first three months 2007.

The increasing movement of Nepalis, mainly labourers, has also contributed to the shortage of air seats.

According to an official at Nepal’s Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation, the government is doing whatever it can in helping the airlines to deal with the shortage of air seats.