SPECIAL REPORT: AVIATION

Why Turkeys Main Airline

Now Flies into Somalia Daily
The Airline has become the most important link between Somalia, Europe and the Middle East
BY MARTIN RIVERS

he visit to Mogadishu by
Turkeys President, Recep
Erdogan in January heralded
welcome news for Somalias battered
but resilient aviation industry.
After landing in the capital to
inaugurate the newly-constructed
terminal at Aden Adde International
Airport, President Erdogan announced
that Turkish Airlines would expand its
Istanbul-Djibouti-Mogadishu service
from four flights a week to daily. That
crucial route serves as a lifeline for
members of the diaspora, enabling
connecting flights to their adoptive
countries in Europe and North
America.
But while Turkeys engagement
with Somalia has to date focussed on
humanitarian assistance (Erdogans

first visited Mogadishu in August

2011 at the height of the East Africa
drought), the decision to increase
flight frequencies was in no way a
charitable gesture.
To the contrary, passenger demand
on the route has grown steadily since
March 2012, when the airline entered
the route as a twice-weekly service
incorporating a stopover in Khartoum.
According to Kayhan Bilgili, Turkish
Airlines country manager for Somalia,
78 per cent of the seats are occupied
year-round, well above the industry
average of 68 per cent for airlines
based in Africa.
Demand is rising day by day. For a
long time, there was no international
connection between the world and
Somalia, but now there is with Turkish
Airlines, he says.
We are operating with an Airbus

320 with 150 passenger capacity, and

we have cargo service also. At the
cargo reservation desk there is always
a queue.
Bilgili insists that there are no plans
to make the route non-stop, noting
that about half of the passengers who
board the flight in Istanbul disembark
in Djibouti. The short stop-over also
allows Turkish Airlines to rotate its
flight crews and redouble security
procedures before entering Somalias
airspace, which is still controlled by
the United Nations owing to perceived
shortcomings in domestic oversight
capabilities.
Nonetheless,
the
introduction
and expansion of the arterial air link
has already transformed Somalias
standing on the international stage,
boosting its security credentials and
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JUNE-AUGUST 2015 THE SOMALIA INVESTOR

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CONTINUED FROM PAGE 15

normalising travel to the country.

When you see Turkish Airlines
going to Somalia, it becomes the same
as going to New York, London, Dubai,
explains Said Korshel, Somalias former
Transport Minister in the cabinet of
Prime Minister Abdiweli Ahmed. It
gives Somalia a safe reputation, which
is really important. We are so grateful
to Turkish Airlines for this. Otherwise,
nobody would come here. They took
the risk, and they showed that it was
safe.
Data from Flight Maps Analytics
illustrate the commercial significance
of the Istanbul link. Although flights
to Nairobi depart more frequently
from Mogadishuat least twice daily
across all airlinesIstanbul accounts
for nearly one third of capacity at the
airport as measured by Available Seat
Kilometres. That reflects the lengthier
distance of the journey: 4,600km,
compared with 1,000km to Nairobi
and 2,800km to Sharjah, the second
furthest point in Mogadishus network.
Istanbuls status as the only mediumhaul air link from Somalia also creates
opportunities for cargo haulage.
In the past, Turkish Airlines had to
deploy dedicated freighter aircraft
to Mogadishu when transporting
humanitarian aid, much of it bound
for the Turkish Cooperation and
Coordination Agency (TIKA) and the
Turkish Red Crescent.
But those ad hoc flights have now
largely been replaced by belly capacity
on passenger services. The A320 has
space for seven cargo containers, and
according to Bilgili about 70 per cent
of the freight transported on the route
is shipped by commercial customers.
While the airline still plays an
active role in moving humanitarian
aid, demand from private-sector
forwarders is rising in step with
passenger demand. This heightened
commercial activity provides knockon benefits to the Somali economy.
According to the World Bank, air
transport directly and indirectly creates
6.9 million jobs and $80.5 billion in
GDP (gross domestic product) for
African economies. By offering air
connectivity to the diaspora and the
business community, Turkish Airlines is
ensuring that Somalia gets its fair slice
of the pie.
We are the only major airline
serving Mogadishu, notes Temel Kotil,
the chief executive of Turkish Airlines.
Everything is under control, [we have
had] no problems, thanks to God. We
are making good profit, and we see
with our own eyes how Somalia is

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THE SOMALIA INVESTOR JUNE-AUGUST 2015

Everything is under
control, [we have had]
no problems, thanks to
God. We are making
good profit, and we see
with our own eyes how
Somalia is developing;
how it is growing
Temel Kotil, chief executive
of Turkish Airlines
developing; how it is growing.
With no official flag-carrier to
promote national interests, given that
Somali Airlines has been grounded
since 1991, Turkish Airlines and its
home base of Istanbul Ataturk Airport
serve as a crucial bridging point for
Somalia.
Though often over-shadowed by
its rivals in the Persian Gulf, the airline
has grown passenger numbers nearly
fivefold to 55 million people over
the past decade. It now deploys 263
aircraft to 264 destinations worldwide.
The success of the business model
and its appeal to Somali customers lies
in Istanbuls geography.

Like Emirates, Etihad and Qatar

Airways, Turkeys flag-carrier has
adopted a so-called sixth-freedom
hub model that aims to connect all
major global destinations through a
single airport at the intersection of
Europe, Asia and Africa.
This geographical good fortune
allows Turkish Airlines to serve
far more points than would be
commercially viable from a less central
locality, such as Mogadishu. That in
turn opens up easy connections for
Somali passengers, who can hop onto
the carriers high-frequency services
to London, Helsinki and other hotspots
for the diaspora.
Within one to two hours [of
landing in Istanbul] we can offer these
connections, and if no connection is
available, we can support customers in
a hotel, Bilgili says.
Crucially, Turkeys aviation knowhow
is also fostering the development
of a self-sufficient Somali sector. In
April 2014, former Prime Minister
Ahmed and former Transport Minister
Korshel laid the foundation stone for
the Turkish-funded Aviation Training
Academy at Aden Adde Airport.
It is not yet clear when the facility will
be operational. A tentative launch date
of mid-2015 now seems optimistic.
Upon completion, it will enable a new
generation of Somalis to inherit and
grow the domestic aerospace industry.

The Turkish Airlines has become a major player on the Mogadishu route