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Regional Business Class
COVID was the acid test for the shareholder support and geog- profit of S$734 million in the first
airline industry and has been the raphy with international airlines three months of FY2023/24.
greatest upheaval it has suffered being impacted the worst.
in modern times. The toll has
been massive and the impacts Singapore Airlines, which went Singapore Airlines’
linger on. According to IATA data into COVID flying high was CEO Goh Choon Phong,
global airline traffic (measured devasted by virtually all interna-
by revenue passenger kilome- tional borders being closed but explains the record
ters) declined by 66% in 2020, luckily its always forward-think- performance and the
and by 58% in 2021, compared ing majority shareholder the rapid ramp up was the
to 2019, producing an economic Singapore Government saw
loss of US$ 244 billion in 2020 COVID as a nasty but passing result of a number of
and US$ 146 billion in 2021 pandemic. key things.
across the value chain, with air- As a result, Singapore Airlines
lines accounting for 70% of the was first out of the blocks when
losses. global travel resumed after the “One is that we were prepar-
How individual airlines navigated COVID pandemic abated and is ing for the recovery right at the
the COVID disaster related to now soaring with record profits beginning of COVID. When
their balance sheet strength, for the SIA Group posting a net COVID first struck, we were
ASIAN AIRLINES & AEROSPACE JANUARY - FEBRUARY 2024 | 7
