Monday, August 26, 2024 “Western airlines, once enthusiastic about resuming routes to China post-COVID, are now scaling back due to low demand and rising operational challenges.” When China reopened its borders after years of COVID-19 restrictions , Western airlines seemed ready to re-enter a once-bustling market. Last year, foreign carriers rushed to restore direct routes to the world’s second-largest economy, which was once famous for sending out high-spending tourists.
Some airlines even announced plans to expand their flight schedules. However, a year later, the outlook has changed dramatically. Many Western airlines are cutting back on flights that were reinstated just a year ago, with aviation industry experts pointing to weak demand due to China’s faltering economy.
The increased operational costs and longer flight times caused by the war in Ukraine—forcing Western airlines to avoid Russian airspace—have further squeezed their profit margins and made them less competitive compared to Chinese airlines, which enjoy a preference among domestic travelers for Chinese-speaking crews. Adding to these challenges, strained geopolitical relations have hindered the complete resumption of flights between China and the United States, as well as some of Washington’s close allies, causing Western tourists to largely look elsewhere. British Airways, for instance, will suspend its London to Beijing route starting October 26, with plans to resume no earlier than November 2025.
Impact of Russian Invasion Chinese President Xi Jinping declared a “no limits” partnership with Russia just weeks before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, opposing sanctions and reinforcing ties with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Since then, Chinese airlines have benefited from shorter northern routes to Europe and North America over Russia’s extensive airspace. In contrast, airlines from other countries have been either banned from Russian airspace or have chosen to avoid it for safety reasons.
This detour, which sometimes also includes bypassing Ukrainian airspace, can add up to three hours to flight times between Asia and Europe, significantly increasing costs. Geopolitical Tensions Most flights from North America to China do not cross Russian airspace, resulting in only minor detours for U.S.
airlines affected by these restrictions. However, flights between the U.S.
and China remain subject to carefully negotiated bilateral agreements. In late March, the U.S.
Department of Transportation raised the weekly round-trip flight quota for Chinese carriers flying to and from the U.S. from 35 to 50.
However, this is still a far cry from the more than 150 weekly round trips allowed by each side before the pandemic-related restrictions took effect in early 2020. Ongoing disputes over issues such as high-end semiconductors and conflicts in the South China Sea have further complicated the situation. According to aviation analytics company Cirium, Chinese airlines have utilized their full allowance of 50 weekly flights to and from the U.
S., while the three U.S.
airlines operating in China—Delta, American Airlines, and United Airlines—are running only 35 flights per week..
