The recovery of passenger traffic at Athens airport has exceeded expectations, paving the way for a new peak in 2023. The cumulative 22.72 million passengers that closed last year confirm the impressive dynamics developed by Greek tourism since June, but also the return of Athens to the aviation map. The opening of new markets, with an emphasis on Asia, is the new big bet for “Eleftherios Venizelos” which yesterday, at a special event, celebrated the long-awaited development of the Greece-China network, which abruptly halted with the start of the pandemic.

The performance of the Athens airport in the twelve months of 2022 was particularly encouraging for the continuation. Especially if you consider that during the first months of the year travel restrictions were still in place to prevent the spread of Covid-19. Despite this unfavorable environment, to which the Russian invasion of Ukraine and energy inflation were added since the beginning of the year, Greek tourism was a positive surprise. Positive prospects, despite the great economic difficulties in Europe and internationally, are evident for 2023 as well.

It recovered 88.9% of 2019 passenger traffic

In total, in 2022 “Eleftherios Venizelos” transported 22.72 million passengers. The improvement over 2021 was impressive as passengers increased by 84.1%. Compared to 2019, when Athens International Airport registered a historic record of 25.58 million passengers, passenger traffic is down by 11.1%. At the same time, however, flights recovered to an even better degree, remaining down year-on-year compared to 2019 by just 5.4%, reflecting the airline companies’ vote of confidence in Athens airport.

Also, international passengers increased by 98.3% compared to 2021, reaching 15.34 million, 13.9% lower than the performance of 2019. Meanwhile, domestic passenger traffic has almost recovered the lost ground, remaining only 4.7% behind pre-pandemic levels.

Moreover, Greece is among the four countries in Europe where passenger traffic exceeded 2019 levels in 2022. For Greece, which remains a mature tourist market, this increase amounted to 1% on an annual basis, with 5,000 more flights, according to Eurocontrol data. The resilience shown by the Greek market in the crisis is also proven by the fact that our country finished eighth in terms of traffic, following huge European markets, with the United Kingdom first, followed by Germany, Spain, France, Italy, Turkey, the Netherlands.

Conditions for the development of Air China activities in Athens

The new Athens-Shanghai connection, launched by Air China on December 22, initially with one flight a week, after the return last July of the Athens-Beijing flight is indicative of the intentions of the Chinese giant, which seeks to become in the following years a leader of international air transport. “The Athens-Shanghai connection is another milestone for Air China’s development in Greece,” said Mr. Heyun Fan, the company’s General Manager for Greece. The first direct connection was established in 2017 with Beijing, but was cut short by the pandemic.

He also emphasized that the further development of these flights with an increase in capacity, i.e. with more weekly flights, will depend on the course of demand, which is largely related to travel restrictions. It is noted that from Sunday, January 8, 2023, China opened its gates to travel after three years, lifting quarantine measures for those entering the country.

But the new outbreak of coronavirus cases in the Land of the Dragon triggered international reflexes, reimposing restrictions on travelers from China. Greece, adopting the recommendations of the European Union, established a mandatory Covid test, no later than 48 hours before departure from China, as well as the use of a high protection mask.

As the Director of Communication and Marketing of the Athens International Airport, Mrs. Ioanna Papadopoulou, commented, focusing on the significant growth rates of the Chinese market before the pandemic, “airlines, since they are planning in the long term, are looking for stability without travel restrictions”.

Great prospects for the Chinese market

Before the pandemic, China was a rapidly growing market for Athens. Passenger traffic hit a record pace as it increased by 166% between the years 203-2019, when the airport’s overall passenger traffic growth moved to +104%. For 2018, total passenger traffic (direct or with an intermediate station) increased by 65%. And the number of passengers arriving directly to Athens more than tripled within a year, from 19,413 in September 2017 to 50,369 in 2018 (a percentage increase of approximately 365%).

This was followed by the year when passenger traffic peaked for the airport. In 2019, the traffic on the Greece-China direct link increased by 22% year-on-year, while through stopovers it increased by 21%. Already, since 2018, the Chinese market entered the Top 20 international markets of “Eleftherios Venizelos”, occupying 15th place for 2019.

Attributing the new restrictive measures imposed by one country after another on Chinese travelers, to “political motives” China’s ambassador to Greece, Mr. Xiao Juncheg, at the event on Air China’s plans in Greece, referred to the great prospects of Greek-Chinese cooperation. Initially, he emphasized that, according to scientists, the variants of the coronavirus that exist today in China already exist in Europe, so there is no concern that new mutations will be “introduced” to justify restrictive measures.

Referring to the signing in the spring of 2022 of the Joint Action Program in the tourism sector between the Tourism Ministries of the two countries, he described it as a road map for increasing tourism flows between the two countries. As he said, at the moment there is a good momentum for the cooperation of the two countries, with Greece already being a mature tourist market with high-level services and human resources, while China presents great growth prospects.

It is noted that before the pandemic, China was the world’s most important country of origin for tourists, with 115 million tourists in 2019, of which 7 million traveled to Europe. The Chinese spent over $250 billion on overseas travel. For 2019, over 217,000 Chinese arrived at Athens airport. So our country has the potential to increase its pie in the Chinese market, which is expected to grow dynamically in the coming years, as the middle class in the Land of the Dragon is set to double to 800 million people.

Headlines