Clark int’l airport passenger list up

CLARK FREEPORT, Pampanga — The Clark International Airport Corporation (CIAC) reported that over 700,000 international passengers arrived at the Diosdado Macapagal International Airport (DMIA) last year.

CIAC recorded over 725,023 international passengers for the year 2011.

The CIAC Corporate Planning Department said international passenger volume increased to 19 percent from the 607,704 passengers in 2010.

The state-run corporation added that it expects Clark airport to experience an exponential growth in passenger volume in the next five to seven years.

“In December 2011 alone, the international passenger volume increased to 80,802, representing a 36 percent increase over the 59,045 figure on the same period last year,” said CIAC President Victor Jose Luciano, adding that they are still expecting the number to increase because of the tourism promotion initiatives of the national government.

By the end of 2012, Luciano said that passenger volume at Clark may reach 5 million once Air Asia Philippines, an international airline company, starts operations this year.

“We expect a growth in passenger volume once Air Asia Philippines starts its flights out of Clark,” he stressed.

He added that since 2003, the Clark airport has already carried more than 3.5 million international passengers.

“This is an accomplishment for the DMIA as it is the first time that a tremendous increase in international passenger volume was achieved. This only shows that the Clark airport is being recognized around the world,” Luciano said.

Luciano, however, said that there is an urgent need to construct a bigger terminal at DMIA as it can only accommodate about 2.5 million international passengers.

“The budget terminal is the only solution to accommodate the 5 million annual passengers that we expect from the slated operations of the Air Asia hub at Clark,” Luciano pointed out.

Luciano said the proposed budget terminal will be presented to Transportation Secretary Mar Roxas.

“The bidding process for the second phase of the expansion of the existing terminal has already started while CIAC officials prepare the plans for the construction of a separate and new budget terminal that will cost an estimated P12 billion with an annual passenger capacity of 10 million,” he said.

DMIA is being groomed to be the premier gateway of the country.

CIAC, the operating arm of DMIA, has already infused P338 million for the expansion of the existing DMIA Terminal 1, increasing passenger capacity to 2.7 million annually.

Mabalacat Mayor Marino “Boking” Morales, Co-Chairman of the Metro Clark Advisory Council, said the government should now look into the development of the Clark airport because “it had been proven several times that it can accommodate the entry of wide commercial aircraft, plus the fact that it will bring in more development to the countryside.”

He said that the country should have more than one premier airport to accommodate both foreign tourists and transfer of goods from the Philippines to other country and vice versa.