Ryanair plans to double the number of passengers it carries to and from Malta after it yesterday officially launched its base here.
Luis Fernandez, the airline's sales manager for Malta, said Ryanair was expected to carry 800,000 passengers a year on its 19 routes, up from the present 400,000.
The airline is also basing a plane and 30 crew, including pilots, in Malta to run the six new routes to Valencia, Seville, Bologna, Krakow, Billund and Marseille, starting this week.
The plane arrived in Malta yesterday, on a morning flight from Valencia, and passengers were greeted with music and handed flowers and small honey rings.
"Through this new base, Malta can now be linked to any of the 153 airports across Europe which Ryanair flies to," Mr Fernandez said, adding that the passengers brought to Malta by the airline would generate 800 jobs. He said the passengers flying Ryanair to and from Malta would be saving a total of €76 million a year.
The new routes, Mr Fernandez said, would be operating all year round and having a plane based in Malta was a stepping stone to further growth. "There is huge potential for future route development from Malta," he said.
Asked whether the mass cancellations across Europe caused by ash from Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano impacted the airline's decision to open the new routes, Mr Fernandez said the decision was taken before the problems started last month.
"The past weeks have obviously been very difficult but we are sticking to our plans despite all these problems," he said.
Mr Fernandez said the airline did not know how many passengers were booked on cancelled Ryanair flights. "It is difficult to give you a figure," he said. Neither did the airline know the financial impact of the ash crisis, he said. "We don't care about finances at the moment but about avoiding further problems and disruptions for our passengers," he said.
Mr Fernandez said the airline had not yet been officially informed of the €3 million fine imposed on it by Italy's civil aviation agency for failing to help passengers who were stranded after their flights were cancelled due to the volcanic ash. "At the moment we have not received any confirmation of the fine and we are complying with legislation," he said.
Tourism Parliamentary Secretary Mario de Marco welcomed the new routes and stressed that accessibility was crucial for an island like Malta where 98 per cent of its tourists arrived by air. Malta is served by 76 routes, mostly to Europe but also to North Africa and the Gulf.
He said figures for the first quarter of 2010 were encouraging and saw an increase of 13,000 passengers, an added 80,000 bed nights and tourism expenditure go up by €20 million.
But he emphasised the need for caution, especially in view of the ash crisis. "We need to keep our fingers crossed and take every window of opportunity," he said. A total of 352 cancelled flights to and from Malta are believed to have cost the island about €11 million in lost tourist spending.
Dr de Marco said some low-level accommodations needed to get their act together and improve their product. "Some give a pretty good service, but others are stuck in a time warp related to 1970s accommodation and have to realise that their client base has changed and their demands have also changed," he said, pointing out that funds were available to help with upgrades.
He said despite the arrival of low cost airlines, Air Malta maintained its share of the market, carrying 56 per cent of passengers last year.
The authorities were having talks with tour operators to increase chartered flights. The government had concluded negotiations with TUI, Saga and Thomas Cook and was in the final stages of discussions with Frosch Touristik GmbH (FTI), one of the biggest operators in the German market. Dr de Marco said British agent Thomas Cook was increasing a weekly flight, which would give passengers more options.