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Mainland, HK expand passenger flights
The Chinese mainland and Hong Kong signed an agreement to increase the number of passenger flights that airlines on both sides can operate, with added capacity for flights to 12 mainland cities, as part of plans to expand air traffic. Starting Tuesday, airlines could increase capacity on these routes by 57 percent, said Wilson Fung, Hong Kong's deputy secretary for economic development and labor. He declined to name the 12 cities. They were included in 45 existing mainland destinations that Hong Kong airlines could fly to, he said. The mainland has signed expanded air services agreements with Hong Kong and countries including the United States and Japan, as the Central Government opens up its aviation market. The mainland's passenger traffic is forecast to grow at a faster pace than the global average every year until 2023, according to a forecast from Airbus SAS, the world's biggest aircraft maker. The new agreement between the mainland and Hong Kong covered the eastern mainland cities of Nanjing and Hangzhou, and Changsha in the south, said the Hong Kong Airport Authority. Major scheduled flights from Hong Kong to mainland cities include Air China Ltd., the mainland's biggest airline, which flies to Hangzhou; China Southern Airlines Co., which flies to Changsha; China Eastern Airlines Corp., which flies to Nanjing; and Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd., Hong Kong's biggest airline, which flies to Beijing and Xiamen. Fung declined to say if Beijing and Xiamen were included in the new agreement. The deal came after the mainland and Hong Kong agreed last September to
increase passenger flights by 30 percent.
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