Eleven bilateral agreements revised

ALAN PEAT IN THE department of transport a number of SA’s bi-lateral air service agreements have been re-negotiated, according to Collen Msibi, spokesman for the department of transport. In the schedule released to FTW by the department, a total of 13 agreements were examined, 11 were revised and two were unchanged. On the route to Madagascar, seven passenger and seven all-cargo flights have been scheduled, with a new route schedule and tariff regime. A full code-share framework was also agreed on. In the revised agreement with France, eight passenger flights a week were scheduled for the summer of 2006, expanded to 10/week for the winter period of 2006/07. For Switzerland, there has been a phasing-in of frequencies. For passenger flights in the winter of 2006/07 there are 10 flights; for the winter season of 07/08 12 flights; and for 08/09 14 flights. For all-cargo, seven flights per week have been scheduled. There has also been a phasing in of frequencies for the UK, with 40 flights a week scheduled for winter of 06/07; and 42 flights for winter 07/08. On the all-cargo side, operation into regional airports without restrictions has been agreed. There’s a draft text in the India-Brazil-SA (IBSA) triumvirate, with 14 passenger flights proposed and seven all-cargo. Co-operative arrangements in other areas, such as, training, security, air navigation and airport management, are also being discussed. Passenger capacity over a phasing-in period has been agreed with Mauritius. With one unit being 100 seats, the winter of 05/06 has been scheduled with 15 units; the summer of 06/07 with 17 units; the summer of 2008 with 19 units; and the summer of 2009 with 21 units. Between SA and Egypt, according to Msibi, “agreement has been reached on Yamoussoukro Decision implementation”; with Rwanda 5th freedom traffic rights with conditions have been agreed; with Korea an agreement on one flight per week and inclusion of a full code-share framework; with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) one additional all-cargo frequency has been agreed; and with Senegal 5th freedom traffic rights out of Senegal to the USA have been agreed. There’s no change for the US bi-lateral, nor for Cameroon – where discussions are due to resume in 2006.