GACA president highlights Saudi Arabia’s booming aviation growth

Speaking at the Airline Economics’ Growth Frontiers conference in Riyadh, president of the Saudi General Authority of Civil Aviation (GACA) Abdulaziz Al-Duialej highlighted how private-public investment in the region’s aviation infrastructure and services is continuing to facilitate huge growth within the sector. “Saudi Arabia is at the start of the most significant aviation industry transformation of the 21^st century,” he explained, with traffic in the region set to further increase rapidly over the coming years. With the Kingdom having recently achieved its milestone of 100 million visitors (a seven-year advance on its previous 2030 predictions), it is the government’s intent to further leverage the “expertise and resources of the private sector” to continue this trajectory. Al-Duialej added that this growth strategy is “not build on future scenarios, but underpins an economic transformation that is happening right now;” noting how Saudi Arabia’s 2023 traffic volume grew 26% to a record 112 million passengers (an 8% rise above 2019’s pre-Covid levels). Among the projects “spanning the entire sector” launched since the initiation of Saudi Arabia’s National Aviation Strategy in 2020 include the establishment of new carrier Riyadh Air (scheduled to commence commercial operations in 2025) and a master plan for Riyadh King Salman Airport, aiming to boost its capacity to 100 million passengers by 2050. The opening of Red Sea International Airport will also play crucial role in boosting connectivity and capacity to the region. 2024 is to be the “year of unprecedented private sector engagement,” continued Al-Duialej, highlighting the first such initiative – the expansion of capacity at Medina Prince Mohammed bin Abdulaziz Airport – as set to increase capacity from eight to 17 million passengers by 2028. A further public-private partnership will also increase Abha International Airport to support ten million passengers by 3030, for which GACA has already received expressions of interest from 100 companies. The pursuit of “essential” renewable fuels and advanced air mobility operations in the region were also discussed, with Al-Duialej explaining: “Any one of these initiatives could be considered a generational project in most aviation systems. Combined, they represent an unprecedented opportunity for global investors, suppliers and operators”.