Airports Authority of India, the nation’s biggest manager of the facilities, is seeking partners to help improve service quality in the world’s second-fastest growing air travel market.
The New Delhi-based state-run agency has had “initial discussions,” with companies that run Seoul, Singapore and Zurich airports, V.P. Agrawal, chairman of Airports Authority, said in an interview. Incheon International Airport Corp.’s Seoul facility was named the world’s best airport for service quality for a fifth straight year in 2011 by Airports Council International, an industry group. Changi Airports International Pte.’s Singapore facility was second.
A partner will help the operator of 97 percent of the civil facilities in India, which ranked below Ethiopia and Namibia in the World Economic Forum’s 2012 score for quality of air transport infrastructure, prepare for a targeted 54 percent jump in passenger traffic by 2017. International Air Transport Association forecasts air travel in India will rise 13 percent by 2016 making it the fastest growing market after Kazakhstan.
04/02/13 Karthikeyan Sundaram/Bloomberg.com
