Bangkok--12 Jun--The Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation
Peter Harbison, Executive Chairman of the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation, opened the third annual Aviation and Tourism Investor Summit in India, stating that, the face of Indian aviation will be unrecognisable in five years time.
Mr Harbison foresees a well-organised, efficient airline industry supported by modern infrastructure and profitable carriers. However, for this vision to occur, he noted, Indian governments — both at the federal and state level — will have to redouble their commitment to reform.
Observing that the sector’s incredible progress of the recent past — “the fastest metamorphosis of a national aviation industry in history” — is almost entirely down to government loosening the shackles on the country’s long-suppressed potential, Mr Harbison sees that the country has once more entered a critical period and that more must be done if progress is not to be lost.
Pointing to the results of a sector survey the Centre conducted among the aviation investment community, he pointed to the negative role investor uncertainty — related to issues of transparency, even-handed application of regulations and policies governing inter-airport competition — is playing in limiting potential new investment in the country, especially in its critical airport sector.
For the sector to reach its potential, Mr Harbison said the Government must institute a clear policy roadmap for the next 5-10 years, fast-track aviation infrastructure development policy and do everything it can to facilitate more private capital — local and international — entering the industry. Key in this will be lifting the levels of permissible foreign direct investment, especially in the area of foreign airlines investing in Indian carriers.
Without these reforms, he said, the country will find it difficult to achieve its still-largely untapped potential, and the momentum of the last few years will be jeopardised.
The Aviation & Tourism Investor Summit, now in its third year, was established with the objective of bringing together governments, CEOs from across the aviation and tourism industries and leading figures from the premier investment banks, private equity funds and venture capitalists, to discuss investment opportunities in the fast growth markets of India and the Middle East.