The CEO of the airline Corsair, Pascal de Izaguirre, said he was more worried about the cost of kerosene than the possibility of a shortage, Monday on BFM Business.
Asked about the most serious consequence of the war in the Middle East for air transport, he replied: “It’s really the economic impact of the increase in price.”
“It’s very simple, compared to the level at which kerosene was before the conflict, prices are moving between two times and two and a half times this level,” he explained on the economic news channel.
“Kerosene represented around 25% of an airline’s total costs. And there, it is between 40 and 45%,” said the man who is also president of the National Federation of Aviation and its Trades (FNAM).
As for a possible shortage of fuel, due to lack of imports from the Gulf countries, “this is a situation that we are monitoring very closely, in liaison with the public authorities. In general, we have six weeks of visibility ahead of us,” said Mr. de Izaguirre.
“The State has strategic stocks for three months, which still allows us to see it coming and spend the summer peacefully,” according to him.
“We can still hope that the conflict will have been resolved by then,” said the boss of Corsair.
This company has assets in this crisis, he said: “We have a network of destinations which has remained away from conflict zones, and which has not been affected (…) by route modifications which result in lengthening, therefore additional consumption”.
He cited “destinations in the Mediterranean basin, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece, which are always the big holiday winners (…) the Antilles, extremely dynamic, even Reunion Island, Mauritius.”
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