Airbus ups aircraft demand forecast

Airbus has raised its forecast for aircraft demand over the next 20 years.

The European planemaker based that on the travel needs of six billion people in emerging economies.

It also said airlines were staging a stronger-than-predicted rebound from recession.

By 2029, a third of all passenger traffic will be in Asia, up from just over a quarter now.

Not surprisingly the maker of the world’s largest passenger plane argues bigger is better.

Airbus sales chief John Leahy said: “If demand doubles in 15 years, then in places like China and India it’s doubling every six years. You can’t just keep putting more and more aircraft into places like Heathrow, Frankfurt, JFK, Los Angeles, Hong Kong. You can’t build that many more airports. You need to be able to meet the demand by having larger aircraft.”

Airbus believes with growth and replacement of older aircraft nearly 26,000 new passenger and freight planes will be delivered between now and 2029.

That is almost 900 more planes that in its previous annual forecast.

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