Malta International Airport plc - August Traffic Results

On 9 September Malta International Airport plc published the August 2009 traffic results. The statistics show a 3.9% decrease in passenger departures during the month of August to 198,683 passengers (August 2008: 206,719). During the first eight months of 2009, passenger departures declined by 8.9%, representing a decrease of 95,873 passengers. At the time of the publication of MIA’s 2009 half-year results, CEO Mr Julian Jaeger had revised downwards the 2009 traffic projections to a decline of 6.8% from the earlier forecast of a 5.5% drop.

In order to reduce the dependency on passenger numbers, MIA is diversifying its sources of revenues by opening up retail and food & beverage outlets for the non-travelling public. MIA’s major retail contract is with Nuance Group which guarantees a minimum revenue of €25 million to MIA for the next six years. Furthermore, MIA recently announced a €16 million investment in a 9-floor commercial building block which will include 14,000 square metres of rentable space. This should further contribute towards increasing the amount of non-aviation revenue to the company which is anticipated to reach 30% of overall income by 2010.