Cape Town Air Access – a partnership between Wesgro, the Western Cape Government, the City of Cape Town, Airports Company South Africa, Cape Town Tourism, and South African Tourism has welcomed the announcement by Singapore Airlines (SIA) that it will fly to Cape Town, via Johannesburg, on a daily basis from 26 March 2018.
This is an increase from its current four flights per week and demonstrates the growing demand for Cape Town as both a business and leisure tourism destination.
According to SIA, they will operate flights to Cape Town using its Airbus A350-900 aircraft, which has the capacity to hold 253 customers (42 Business Class, 24 in Premium Economy Class and 187 in Economy Class).
Tim Harris, Wesgro CEO said that this is a big boost for the Cape economy. “This increased frequency will boost air access to Asia, the fastest growing region in the world. Singapore’s Changi Airport is a major global hub, making it easy to fly to Cape Town from anywhere in the East.”
“The benefits of this connectivity is significant. Making it easier to access Cape Town by air, increases the number of visitors to our shores. This will not only boost leisure tourism, a major economic contributor to the Cape economy, but will also help facilitate investment. Indeed businessman and woman will now be able to come and see for themselves the excellent opportunities on offer in the Western Cape.”
Alan Winde, Minister of Economic Opportunities, said:
“Air access is a pipeline to growing our economy and creating jobs. Singapore Airlines’ decision to increase their frequency to our region is a show of confidence in the business and leisure tourism offering of our region. This is the latest in a series of new and expanded direct routes, which have increased international air arrivals by 27% year-on-year. The Cape Town Air Access initiative has played a significant role in boosting air arrivals to our region, and I’d like to commend the team for their continued commitment to growing the Western Cape’s tourism sector, and tourism jobs in our region.”
The Cape Town Air Access project’s key objective is to land more direct routes to Cape Town International Airport. Its success has far exceeded expectations. In its two and a half years, it has assisted in landing 10 new routes to Cape Town and now 12 route expansions. This has increased seat capacity into Cape Town International by over 700,000.
Cape Town International Airport has as a result shown high international growth figures with passenger numbers up by 23% in the first 9 months of 2017. The Asian market is also growing at double-digit figures, with high growth in South East Asia, in particular from Thailand, Malaysia and the Philippines.
“On behalf of the Cape Town Air Access Initiative, I would like to thank SIA for showing confidence in the Cape,” concluded Harris.
