Airport passenger traffic continues to grow nationwide

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PUTRAJAYA: Passenger traffic recorded at airports nationwide in the first six months of the year, grew by four per cent to 33,183,608 passengers, as compared to 31,909,775 passengers in the same period last year.

Transport Minister Datuk Seri Kong Cho Ha said, of the passengers recorded from January to June, 17,349,176 were domestic passengers compared with 16,820,281 for the same period last year.

“There was also a 3.14 per cent increase for international passengers which increased to 15,834,432, as compared to 15,089,494 in same period in 2011,” he said in a statement here yesterday.

He said the increase was due to higher demand for air travel, increase in flight frequencies and the resumption of operations by local and foreign aviation companies.

Therefore, noted Kong, the construction of the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) 2 which was still in progress, would help ease passenger flow as the new airport could accommodate another 4.5 million passengers.

“The government is also upgrading several city airports such as in Penang, Ipoh and Sibu,” he said. — Bernama