5 August 2007 , Habib Shaikh
JEDDAH — Garuda Indonesia will not be banned from flying into Saudi Arabia, according to official sources in Jakarta.
Earlier, Saudi Arabia was considering a ban on the airline following a similar ban enforced by the European Union.
The US Federal Aviation Authority had decided in April to downgrade Indonesia’s safety rating that amounted to a de facto ban. No Indonesian carrier currently flies to either Europe or the United States.
The ban came in the wake of two major air disasters in the Asian archipelago since the beginning of the year. The Kingdom put off the ban plan pending the visit of a team of experts to Jakarta for a review and inspection of its facilities and operations.
A six-member team of the General Authority of Civil Aviation (GACA) of Saudi Arabia had inspected all of Garuda’s facilities, operations and training centres and expressed satisfaction over the safety standards.
The Saudi team comprised Capt. Berenji, and was accompanied by Babang Sudaryono, Jeddah-based communication attache at the Consulate General of Indonesia.
“Saudi Arabia will not ban or restrict Garuda from flying to that country, whether regular or Haj flights,” Indonesian Transportation Minister Jusman Syafii Djamal told the media in Jakarta on Friday. Garuda operates eight flights a week from Jakarta to Jeddah, of which three are via Riyadh. It has planned up to 60 extra flights between June and September to transport Umrah pilgrims.
The carrier is planning to fly 210,000 Haj pilgrims this year. After years in the red, Garuda has posted a net profit of $15.93 million in the first half of this year. According to Garuda Executive Vice President Agus Priyanto, the airline’s revenues are expected to further increase in the second half as more passengers will fly during the year-end holiday season.
Thursday, August 9, 2007
No ban on Garuda flights to Saudi (Khaleej Time Online)
Thursday, August 2, 2007
Garuda Indonesia Posts 1H Net Profit, Garuda Indonesia Reports Half-Year Net Profit of $15.898 Million
August 2/2007
JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) -- National carrier Garuda Indonesia said Thursday it booked a half-year net profit of US$15.898 million (euro11.6 million), swinging from a US$38.786 million (euro28.3 million) loss a year earlier.ADVERTISEMENT Chief Executive Emirsyah Satar said Garuda's efforts to improve its performance, such as restructuring routes, contributed to its financial turnaround.
Passenger numbers grew 8 percent to 4.3 million during the January-June period from a year earlier, Satar said.
He said Garuda's load factor improved to 76 percent from 70 percent last year, while the number of revenue-generating domestic routes increased to 26 from only seven last year.
Meanwhile, Satar said the airline was optimistic that it would not be banned from flying to Saudi Arabia.
A team from the Saudi civil aviation authority is in Indonesia to verify Garuda's safety standards, following the European Commission's recent decision to ban all Indonesian commercial carriers from flying to the region on safety grounds.
Saudi Arabia uses the E.U.'s aviation policy as a reference but has not banned Indonesian airlines yet.
"I have met with them and they said that they are satisfied," Satar said. "Garuda is judged to have met international aviation standards."
The state-owned Garuda is the only local airliner that flies to Saudi Arabia, carrying about 200,000 Muslims every year to that country for the Haj pilgrimage.
The company has appealed to the E.U. to lift the ban, claiming the airline complies with international aviation safety standards.
Garuda lifted by Saudi Arabian all-clear (The Financial Times)
Published: August 2 2007 17:18 Last updated: August 2 2007 17:18
Garuda Indonesia, the national carrier, on Thursday welcomed a decision by Saudi Arabia not to adopt a European Union ban on Indonesian airlines and said this year would see its first profit since 2003.
The EU last month banned all Indonesian airlines from flying to its 27 member countries, citing poor airline safety and regulatory supervision standards following two crashes. Saudi Arabia usually follows EU transport commission rulings but, after Indonesian lobbying, decided to investigate first.
Jusman Djamal, Indonesia’s transport minister, on Thursday said an audit team from Saudi Arabia’s General Authority of Civil Aviation had declared Garuda fit to fly to the kingdom.
Garuda does not fly to Europe, so is not directly affected by the EU move, but it flies 300,000 people to Saudi Arabia each year.
The airline on Thursday announced a first-half net profit of Rp148bn ($16m) compared with a loss of Rp361bn in the same period a year earlier. Revenue increased to $570m from $494m, while the load factor rose to 76 per cent from 70 per cent and the revenue per seat per kilometre flown rose 8 per cent to 7.2 US cents.
Garuda lost Rp800bn in 2004, Rp688bn in 2005 and Rp197bn in 2006. Mr Emirsyah insisted this year’s figure would be a profit.
The airline has debts of $640m and it has failed to reach a restructuring agreement with European export credit agencies, its large creditors.
Alex Maneklaran, finance director, said he hoped an agreement would be struck this year. Garuda also intended to sell several non-core assets such as buildings and land as part of its cost-cutting programme, he said.
The Indonesian government, which owns Garuda, has promised to inject Rp1,000bn to prop up the company. It has disbursed half of that but Mr Maneklaran said the money had been allocated to debt refinancing.
This year the government said it would sell up to 49 per cent of the company but that has been postponed until the debts have been refinanced.
Monday, July 30, 2007
Airline woes for Indo tourism (The Bruinei Times)
31/07/07
Dewi Kurniawati
JAKARTA 30-Jul-07AS THE country reels under economic, political and environmental troubles, Indonesia has a new burden to shoulder: an airlines' ban that has a direct impact on its tourism.
The European Union officially banned all 51 Indonesian airlines from flying to Europe starting on July 6, while the US Federal Aviation Administration in April declared Indonesia had failed to comply with international safety standards.
Indonesia's air-safety record has been under fire following two commercial airline crashes that killed 123 people this year alone. EU's Transport Commissioner Jacques Barrot said the blacklist is considered an important tool in preventing unsafe airlines from flying to Europe and in informing passengers worldwide of safety problems.
Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono immediately expressed disappointment at the ban, calling it "the EU's unilateral action," and demanding more room for dialogue.Although government officials downplayed the impact, the EU's ban has already begun hurting tourism. "EU's airline ban has definitely put a burden on Indonesian tourism, especially now that it's the summer high-season for tourist arrivals," Bali Tourism Board chairman Ngurah Wijaya said.
"I know many tourists have cancelled their visits.
Indonesia has set a target of 6 million foreign visitors for this year and 8 million in 2009 nationwide.
The country had missed its tourist-arrival target of 5.5 million in 2006, registering 4.8 million foreign visitors for the year.
To help sweeten the package for foreigners, the government has allowed the citizens of 63 countries to be granted visas on arrival in the archipelago nation.
But the EU contributes about 25 per cent of tourist to the resort island of Bali alone, with as many as 600,000 European tourists visiting the country each year. Since Bali has an international airport facility, tourists who already planned their holiday before the ban took effect may yet fly to Bali with other airlines via Singapore.
"But it will definitely hurt other parts of Indonesia's tourism spots like Yogyakarta, Borneo and Sulawesi island, as tourists then have to take domestic flights," Wijaya said. DPA
EU ban on Indonesian airlines hurting tourism industry (Earth Times)
31/07/07
Jakarta - As the country reels under economic, political and environmental troubles, Indonesia has a new burden to shoulder: an airlines' ban that has a direct impact on its tourism.
The European Union officially banned all 51 Indonesian airlines from flying to Europe starting on July 6, while the US Federal Aviation Administration in April declared Indonesia had failed to comply with international safety standards.
Indonesia has dozens of low-cost airlines following the deregulation of the industry in the late 1990s, leading to a quadrupling of passenger numbers over the past seven years. But its air-safety record has been under fire following two commercial airline crashes that killed 123 people this year alone.
EU's Transport Commissioner Jacques Barrot said the blacklist is considered an important tool in preventing unsafe airlines from flying to Europe and in informing passengers worldwide of safety problems. "Honestly, the blacklist itself is not surprising since we have had many airline accidents recently," Indonesian Transport Ministry director general for aviation Budi Mulyawan Suyitno said. "Although there is no direct impact - because no Indonesian airlines have been flying to Europe since 2004 - we will improve our safety measures for Indonesian airlines," he said. Even so, the Indonesian government had earlier ignored two letters of inquiry the EU sent to the transport ministry, before it decided to blacklist the country's airlines.
Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono immediately expressed disappointment at the ban, calling it "the European Union's unilateral action," and demanding more room for dialogue. Transport Minister Jusman Djamal mulled a tit-for-tat action by hinting at the option of restricting access to its airspace for EU planes, or of advising its citizens not to fly with European airlines.
But the latter invitation is likely to fall on deaf ears, as many polls conducted by local media show that most Indonesians are in fact worried about flying with their national airlines due to their poor safety records. "I demand the government improve the quality and safety of our transportation immediately," Laksmindra Setyawati, 30, an employee with an international NGO in Jakarta said. Although government officials downplayed the impact, the EU's ban has already begun hurting tourism. "European Union's airline ban has definitely put a burden on Indonesian tourism, especially now that it's the summer high-season for tourist arrivals," Bali Tourism Board chairman Ngurah Wijaya said. "I know many tourists have cancelled their visits. "It will not only effect tourist arrivals, but will also hurt Indonesia's economy, because it will decrease hotel occupancy rates, souvenir sales, and other things related to tourism," Wijaya said. Indonesia has set a target of 6 million foreign visitors for this year and 8 million in 2009 nationwide.
The country had missed its tourist-arrival target of 5.5 million in 2006, registering 4.8 million foreign visitors for the year. To help sweeten the package for foreigners, the government has allowed the citizens of 63 countries to be granted visas on arrival in the archipelago nation. But the European Union contributes about 25 per cent of tourist to the resort island of Bali alone, with as many as 600,000 European tourists visiting the country each year. "European tourists are in fact important to Indonesian tourism," Wijaya said. He explained that since Bali has an international airport facility, tourists who already planned their holiday before the ban took effect may yet fly to Bali with other airlines via Singapore. "But it will definitely hurt other parts of Indonesia's tourism spots like Yogyakarta, Borneo and Sulawesi island, since tourists then have to take domestic flights," Wijaya said. Indonesia's efforts to improve air safety following a string of accidents and near-misses has so far resulted in revoking licenses of four airlines and suspending five others for failing to comply with basic standards in late June.
Earlier this month, Indonesia signed a joint declaration with International Civil Aviation Organization pledging to improve safety, restructure and strengthen the supervisory capacity of the air transport directorate-general, and meet international standards. "Our country's tourism image has been damaged by strings of terrorist attacks, natural disasters and diseases such as bird flu, we can't afford to lose more tourists by this airlines ban," Wijaya said. "We can't just provide excuses anymore, it is a fact that our image is terrible, we need to do something about it before other countries follow EU's ban," he said.
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Ministry cleared Jetstar to land, will not investigate incident (The Jakarta Post, Jakarta)
26/07/07
Alvin Darlanika Soedarjo,
The Transportation Ministry said Tuesday it had issued a clearance for the Australian airline Jetstar to make its emergency landing in Bali after the plane suffered engine failure on its flight from Bangkok to Melbourne.
The ministry said it did not need to investigate the incident.
"According to the International Air Transport Association convention, we need to assist an international carrier that needs to make an emergency landing here," Director General of Air Transport at the Transportation Ministry, Budhi M. Suyitno, told The Jakarta Post.
The engine failure prompted the Airbus A330-200, carrying 302 passengers and 12 crew members, to land at the Ngurah Rai Airport just outside Bali's provincial capital of Denpasar early Monday.
The airplane was flying in Indonesian airspace when one of its two engines experienced problems.
Jetstar is the budget subsidiary of Qantas Airways.
"Jetstar has sent another aircraft to fly the passengers to Melbourne," Budhi said.
"However, the faulty aircraft is still in the airport for repair."
The passengers had to wait for about 17 hours before they were flown to Australia.
Budhi said his office followed up the incident by asking for a report from the civil aviation regulatory body of Australia on the cause of the engine failure.
Transportation expert from The Gadjah Mada University, Heru Sutomo, told the Post that as an addition to Australian investigators, Indonesia, as the country where the aircraft was diverted to, could offer local investigation assistants.
"I'm not sure that Indonesia has an official body that is recognized internationally to investigate aircraft incidents," Heru said.
"Only regulatory bodies from advanced countries, such as the U.S. or European countries, have standardized teams for incident investigations," Heru said.
Indonesia has a team for accident investigation for similar scenarios, he said, but the best Indonesia could do was to trust the Australian airline and civil aviation regulatory body.
"A report from Jetstar is not enough -- its report is invalid without a report from the country's regulator."
With regard to Europe's recent airline prohibition against Indonesia, the Transportation Ministry said it was preparing to send official documents and safety progress reports to the European Union.
"The EU official has yet to specify when they will arrive in Indonesia," said Transportation Ministry spokesman Bambang Ervan.
"But we expect them to come in early August."
The EU slapped a ban on all Indonesian airlines on July 6 despite the fact no carriers fly into EU territory at the moment.
However, before the ban, flag carrier Garuda Indonesia announced plans to resume flights into EU territory.
President deplores EU`s ban on RI airlinesSeoul (ANTARA News)
26/07/07
Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono deplored the European Union (EU)`s recent decision to ban Indonesian airlines to fly to the EU region."I have received an explanation from the transportation minister after Europe issued the unilateral decision which I do not like. In international relations it is good if we respect each other.
Let us not take unilateral actions because we nead each other in global cooperation," the president said at a press conference here on Wednesday.President Yudhoyono called on all countries, including European countries, to cooperate and not to make unilateral decisions."The spirit of cooperation is not unilateral. I always convey this to friendly countries everywhere," he said.He said the government had already conducted an investigation and discovered that the EU decision was made because a director general at an Indonesian ministry had been too slow in responding to a letter. "The problem was caused by the slow response from the director general.
It is a matter of regret that such a thing has happened. Someone who has caused problems to the state had better quit his r position. Whoever he was, he has tarnished our image, and harmed our economy and transportation sector ," he said.The president said he had asked the transportation minister and the National Aviation Safety Team to conduct negotiations, including with Saudi Arabia which had almost made the same decision."Saudi Arabia did not do it.
Although they use the EU as a reference, because of its good relations with Indonesia. Saudi Arabia did not want to issue a ban," he said.Regarding the decision of the South Korea`s flight safety authorities to blacklist Garuda as a sub-standard airline in terms of safety the president director of the airline, Emirsyah Satar said that South Korea would continue to allow Garuda planes to fly into that country."There is no ban for Indonesian airlines` aircraft to land in any airport in that country," he said.He said he received the assurance from the president of South Korean Airlines, Young-Ho Kim in a meeting on Tuesday.(*)
