HANOI, Feb. 22 (Xinhua) -- Vietnam's air passenger traffic in the first two months of 2023 surged 91.5 percent year on year, with the most significant increases recorded for international travelers, Vietnam News Agency cited the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam as reporting on Wednesday.
Passenger traffic jumped to nearly 20 million in the January-February period as global airline traffic is on the way to full recovery, data showed.
Vietnamese airports handled 4.7 million international passengers, up 20-fold from that in the same period last year, while the number of domestic passengers increased 48 percent to 14.8 million, according to the aviation regulator.
The International Air Transport Association expected this year's international passenger traffic to surge to 80 percent of the pre-pandemic levels after global air traffic recovered to 68.5 percent of 2019 levels last year.
Vietnam's aviation industry is set to fully recover by the end of this year when the number of passengers and cargo transported by air this year in the Southeast Asian country will rise 45.4 percent and 15 percent from 2022 respectively, or up 1 percent and 14.8 percent over the pre-pandemic period in 2019, said the global aviation body.
Last year, 99 million passengers, including 12 million international visitors and 87 million domestic arrivals, went through 22 civil airports in Vietnam, up more than 300 percent from 2021, according to figures released by the Airports Corporation of Vietnam.
Vietnam aims to operate 30 airports by 2030 to promote tourism and boost the aviation industry. ■
