Etihad Airways to Open Link to East Africa

United Arab Emirates (UAE) carrier Etihad Airways is to inaugurate passenger flights between Abu Dhabi and Nairobi from April 1, 2012, its first step into the expanding East African market. The airline will operate a daily service using a two-class Airbus A320 with 16 Pearl Business class and 120 Coral Economy seats, adding to its existing cargo flights on the route. There are already four daily passenger flights from the UAE to the Kenyan capital, while Rwandair Express flies between Mombasa and Dubai as a continuation of its Kigali service.

As the table below shows, Emirates Airline is the largest carrier in this market with its two daily flights to Nairobi from Dubai; Kenya Airways also offers a daily service to Dubai and low-cost carrier Air Arabia has a daily rotation to Sharjah. Outside of the UAE in the wider Middle Eastern market, Gulf Air and Qatar Airways serve Nairobi from Bahrain and Doha, respectively, and Saudi Arabian Airlines and Yemenia also fly to Kenya.

“This new route will allow Etihad to tap into large traffic flows between East Africa, North Asia and the Indian Subcontinent,” said James Hogan, Chief Executive Officer, Etihad Airways. “Our strategy is to target areas of strong growth in emerging economies such as North, East and Central Africa and we have a number of other destinations under active consideration.”

Nairobi is an ideal addition to Etihad’s global footprint as there are an estimated 38,000 Kenyan nationals residing in the UAE and the table above clearly shows there is already a large and established point-to-point traffic flow between the two countries. According to tourism statistics more than two million overseas visitors travelled to Kenya in 2010, including some 295,000 from the Middle East. The new route will also service the considerable and growing flow of people and capital between Kenya and North Asia, with major Chinese investment in Africa generating passenger demand in both directions.