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Jaffna International Airport should be developed with a proper business plan after a feasibility study is done to avoid it becoming like the Mattala International Airport that was developed without any feasibility studies or business plan.
Leader of the House and Transport, Highways, Ports and Civil Aviation Minister Bimal Rathnayake responding to a question raised by opposition MP S. Shritharan told Parliament yesterday that the Government will carry out the phase two expansion development project of the Jaffna International Airport only after a proper survey.
The Minister said that the Jaffna International Airport should become a success story unlike the Mattala International Airport. He said that plans are made to do minor renovations to the Runway to increase the passenger capacity from the present 70 up to 130.
“Presently, two daily flights operate from the Jaffna International Airport to Chennai and Tiruchirappalli (Trichy) with a seating capacity of around 70. In order to expand the Jaffna International Airport to accommodate wide bodied aircraft in its second phase of development, a massive cost has to be incurred to expand the runway, entrance to the runway, Aircraft Parking area and the passenger terminal to provide sufficient facilities according to international civil aviation standards. This may also require acquiring additional land from the surrounding area of the existing Jaffna Airport.”
The Minister said that in order to attract more local and foreign passengers, the embarkation fee has been reduced at the Palaly Airport (Jaffna International Airport) than the fee charged at the Bandaranaike International Airport (BIA). He said that the presently reduced embarkation fee charged in the Jaffna International Airport can be further reduced but that itself will not cause more passengers to arrive at the Jaffna Airport.
“The Jaffna International Airport expansion project is carried out under two phases. For the development work under the first phase, tenders have been already called and for the expansion of the terminal in the second phase, tenders will be called in a month’s time.
These will be carried out according to Government approved procurement procedures.
Source: https://www.dailynews.lk/
