Africa could see open skies as early as 2017.

Heads of the member states of the African Union (AU) met in Addis Ababa recently and reaffirmed their commitment to establish a single air transport market in Africa. They also agreed to develop regulatory frameworks to expedite the implementation of the single air transport market and engage all specialised institutions in the aviation sector to support member states in this process. The 11 countries implicated currently in the open skies discussions are: Benin, Cape Verde, Congo Republic, Côte d’Ivoire, Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa and Zimbabwe.

African ministers have been talking about the possibility of open skies for decades, with first the Yamoussoukro Declaration in 1988 followed by the Yamoussoukro Decision in in 1999. Twenty seven years after the first mention of open skies, nothing much has changed.

The AU now seems to recognise the benefit of liberalisation and seems ready to drive things forward, says Linden Birns, MD of Plane Talking. He says Iata recently submitted a report to the AU that clearly outlines the benefits of the implementation of the Yamoussoukro Decision. The report shows that the additional services generated by intra-African liberalisation between just 12 key markets would provide an extra 155 000 jobs and US$1,3bn (R15bn) in annual GDP. The 12 nations in the report are: Algeria, Angola, Egypt, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Namibia, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, Tunisia and Uganda.

For Raphael Kuuchi, Iata’s VP for Africa, the fact that the AU has recognised the value of open skies and has reaffirmed its commitment to pursuing the Yamoussoukro agenda is extremely heartening. “We welcome the urgency the African Union is now bringing to this long-delayed objective.”    

But whether this can be achieved by 2017 is highly ambitious. If all the stakeholders agree and are ready to take action, it is possible to achieve open skies by 2017 but it will be a massive challenge, says Chris Zweigenthal, CE of Aasa. “We can’t hold liberalisation off any longer.” However, Chris also points out that, in a lot of countries, legislation will still need to be implemented and adjusted to allow for open skies.

Rodger Foster, CEO and MD of Airlink, says: “A single market implies open skies without any political boundaries where any African domiciled airline has access to any domestic or inter State intra-Africa market. This would imply a central aeronautical authority and a central jurisdiction for aircraft domicile, registration and issuance of Air Operating Certificates.”

Rodger warns that impediments still lie in many African countries whose aim it is the protection of their national carrier rather than looking after the interests of the travelling public at large.