`Short-Term Objective Is To Establish Mumbai As Our Commercial Hub In India’

Raj Bhujohory, general manager, Air Mauritius, in an exclusive interview with Express Travel & Tourism, talks about the airline’s future strategies for the Indian sub-continent. Excerpts

What is Air Mauritius’s plan for the Indian market in the coming months?

For Air Mauritius (MK), India is a investment market. Tourist arrivals from India between 2000 and 2003 have grown at an average annual rate of 17 per cent. The growth for the calendar year 2003 stood at 21 per cent. On its part, MK has recorded in 2003-04 a growth of 23 per cent on Mumbai, 19 per cent on Delhi and 18 per cent on Chennai respectively. Furthermore, India has steadily grown to be a major contributor on the Mauritius-India route with 47 per cent of total traffic in 2003-04 compared to 37 per cent share in 1999-2000. This trend is expected to continue as a result of liberalisation of the Indian economy. From this perspective, the immediate plan basically consists of meeting the expected demand for travel. However, such growth cannot be sustained without necessary injection of capacity on the route. We understand that it is in this context that the Indian aviation authorities have decided to decree an Open Sky Policy for three months starting November 2004 which will enable airline operators to meet passenger demand.

It is normally seen that the tourism board-airline nexus works well for a destination, are you looking into this kind of promotion?

All the stakeholders of the tourism industry aim to promote the destination which in our case is Mauritius. This objective cannot be achieved if there is lack of concerted efforts based on a coherent strategy. MK has always endeavoured to work closely with all the partners of the trade. From this perspective, Air Mauritius and the Mauritius Tourism Promotion Authority (MTPA) has always worked together in order to promote the destination in various markets. For instance, MTPA and the airline together with other stakeholders have planned a series of promotional activities/ road-shows during the second fortnight of September in New Delhi, Ahmedabad, Mumbai, Kolkata. We shall also be present at the TAAI convention to be held in Kolkata and other trade fairs such the Kerala Travel Mart. MK is also participating in advertising campaigns with other stakeholders.

How important is the Indian market? Are you looking at new hubs and destinations, increase in connectivity etc?

India is a very important market for Air Mauritius. With more disposable income and an emerging affluent middle class, there is an increasing number of Indians wanting to travel for leisure. It is from this perspective that Mauritius represents an attractive and affordable quality destination for Indians. The future strategy of our airline and the various stakeholders of the industry will be therefore to reinforce the positioning of Mauritius as a prime quality destination. On its part, MK is well poised to obtain a share of this traffic, especially in view of its services to the three main gateways in India. We shall be operating eight weekly flights from November and will inject additional capacity to meet peak demand. Though MK will continue to operate to Delhi, Chennai and Mumbai, the short-term objective is to establish Mumbai as our commercial hub in India. We already have in place a number of commercial arrangements with Air-India, Indian Airlines and Air Sahara, which gives the airline significant opportunity to penetrate the Indian market and boost traffic on the international India-Mauritius trunk services.

What have your load factors been on flights out of India?

For the period April 2003-March 2004, the airline recorded an annual average load factor of 80 per cent on the Mauritius-India route.