South Asia - Air transport, passengers carried

The value for Air transport, passengers carried in South Asia was 80,276,160 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 50 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 190,986,500 in 2019 and a minimum value of 4,070,900 in 1971.

Definition: Air passengers carried include both domestic and international aircraft passengers of air carriers registered in the country.

Source: International Civil Aviation Organization, Civil Aviation Statistics of the World and ICAO staff estimates.

See also:

Year Value
1970 4,400,200
1971 4,070,900
1972 4,363,900
1973 5,141,900
1974 4,983,200
1975 6,225,200
1976 7,422,400
1977 8,481,700
1978 9,790,500
1979 10,583,900
1980 10,964,100
1981 12,195,300
1982 13,529,900
1983 14,473,100
1984 15,846,600
1985 17,084,600
1986 18,061,800
1987 19,186,000
1988 20,656,900
1989 20,406,500
1990 18,916,100
1991 18,692,200
1992 19,784,000
1993 18,013,800
1994 20,433,000
1995 23,175,700
1996 22,444,800
1997 25,538,500
1998 25,389,700
1999 25,506,900
2000 26,822,530
2001 26,775,370
2002 25,502,240
2003 27,975,360
2004 33,660,740
2005 38,307,150
2006 51,488,170
2007 62,460,540
2008 60,323,620
2009 64,195,660
2010 78,888,190
2011 91,031,850
2012 89,645,450
2013 93,893,400
2014 102,251,100
2015 120,221,900
2016 142,492,700
2017 162,909,000
2018 189,594,400
2019 190,986,500
2020 80,276,160

Development Relevance: Transport infrastructure - highways, railways, ports and waterways, and airports and air traffic control systems - and the services that flow from it are crucial to the activities of households, producers, and governments. Because performance indicators vary widely by transport mode and focus (whether physical infrastructure or the services flowing from that infrastructure), highly specialized and carefully specified indicators are required to measure a country's transport infrastructure. The air transport industry a vital engine of global socio-economic growth. It is of vital importance for economic development, creating direct and indirect employment, supporting tourism and local businesses, and stimulating foreign investment and international trade. Economic growth, technological change, market liberalization, the growth of low cost carriers, airport congestion, oil prices and other trends affect commercial aviation throughout the world.

Limitations and Exceptions: The air transport data represent the total (international and domestic) scheduled traffic carried by the air carriers registered in a country. Countries submit air transport data to International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) on the basis of standard instructions and definitions issued by ICAO. In many cases, however, the data include estimates by ICAO for nonreporting carriers. Where possible, these estimates are based on previous submissions supplemented by information published by the air carriers, such as flight schedules. The data cover the air traffic carried on scheduled services, but changes in air transport regulations in Europe have made it more difficult to classify traffic as scheduled or nonscheduled. Thus recent increases shown for some European countries may be due to changes in the classification of air traffic rather than actual growth. In the case of multinational air carriers owned by partner States, traffic within each partner State is shown separately as domestic and all other traffic as international. "Foreign" cabotage traffic (i.e. traffic carried between city-pairs in a State other than the one where the reporting carrier has its principal place of business) is shown as international traffic. A technical stop does not result in any flight stage being classified differently than would have been the case had the technical stop not been made. For countries with few air carriers or only one, the addition or discontinuation of a home-based air carrier may cause significant changes in air traffic. Data for transport sectors are not always internationally comparable. Unlike for demographic statistics, national income accounts, and international trade data, the collection of infrastructure data has not been "internationalized."

Statistical Concept and Methodology: For statistical uses, departures are equal to the number of landings made or flight stages flown. A flight stage is the operation of an aircraft from take-off to its next landing. A flight stage is classified as either international or domestic. International flight stage is one or both terminals in the territory of a State, other than the State in which the air carrier has its principal place of business. Domestic flight stage is not classifiable as international. Domestic flight stages include all flight stages flown between points within the domestic boundaries of a State by an air carrier whose principal place of business is in that State. Flight stages between a State and territories belonging to it, as well as any flight stages between two such territories, should be classified as domestic. This applies even though a stage may cross international waters or over the territory of another State. The number of passengers carried is obtained by counting each passenger on a particular flight (with one flight number) once only and not repeatedly on each individual stage of that flight, with a single exception that a passenger flying on both the international and domestic stages of the same flight should be counted as both a domestic and an international passenger.

Aggregation method: Sum

Periodicity: Annual

Classification

Topic: Infrastructure Indicators

Sub-Topic: Transportation