The number of passengers accessing Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport last year grew 3.69 percent from a year earlier to 46.53 million, Taoyuan International Airport Corp (TIAC, 桃園國際機場公司) said yesterday, adding that the result means it is one of the world’s 50 busiest international airports.
Citing 2017 statistics from the Airports Council International, the airport company said that only about 50 airports among more than 50,000 international airports worldwide were accessed by 40 million or more passengers per year.
“This means that Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport has made it to the major leagues of airports,” TIAC said.
Photo: CNA
The company also attributed continued growth in the number of passengers accessing the airport to booming development among low-cost carriers, as well as the government’s New Southbound Policy.
Compared with 2017, passengers on low-cost carriers rose by 12.05 percent to reach about 8.49 million last year, the company said.
Meanwhile, the number of air travelers from nations targeted by the policy — Southeast and South Asian nations, as well as Australia and New Zealand — increased by 9.84 percent to 11.32 million, TIAC data showed.
The number of passengers from China rose 1.91 percent to 8.03 million, the company said.
To meet the challenges introduced by continued growth in passenger numbers, TIAC said that it has expanded service areas in Terminal 2 and is pushing for construction of its third terminal.
The airport has also provided self-service check-in facilities and electronic passport-control gates to improve service quality, it said.
Meanwhile, EVA Airways Corp (長榮航空) was rated by AirlineRatings.com as one of the 20 safest airlines in the world, along with Qantas Airways Ltd, All Nippon Airways Co, Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd (國泰航空), American Airlines Group Inc, Emirates, Qatar Airways Ltd, Lufthansa AG, Singapore Airlines Ltd and Air New Zealand Ltd.
EVA Airways has made the list’s top 20 safest airlines for six years consecutively.
The result, which was released on Thursday, came after the Web site evaluated the flight safety performance of 405 airlines over the past 10 years.
It takes various indicators into consideration, including safety inspection results from civil aviation authorities, fleet management, standards for aircraft maintenance and flight safety records.
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