Ambassador: Air Serbia to decide on Toronto flights
The Canadian Ambassador to Serbia, Giles Norman, has said bureaucratic conditions for the launch of flights between Belgrade and Toronto have been met and that it is now up to Air Serbia to decide whether it will launch the transatlantic service. “In May 2018, Canada and Serbia signed an Air Transport Agreement as part of the ongoing process of acquiring the necessary permits to allow direct Air Serbia flights between Belgrade and Toronto. The Embassy of Canada has supported the Serbian national air carrier’s efforts in receiving these permits, but the decision on further developments is with Air Serbia. The introduction of a direct flight between Canada and Serbia would be highly welcomed by the large Serbian and regional diaspora in Canada, as well as by businesses from both countries as it would encourage the further expansion of growing economic ties between the two nations”, Mr Norman said.
Speaking at the Southeast Europe Aviation Summit last week, the Ambassador added, “Certainly in the Southern Ontario area around Toronto there is a large Serbian diaspora. We don’t have exact figures, but it is over 100.000 people. So, it is very vibrant and economically active. It would be a good route. It is now a business decision that they [Air Serbia] have got to make whether they want to advance that route. I imagine that in the time of Covid they have a lot of opportunities but also a lot of challenges but certainly from an Embassy point of view, we would be very supportive. The diaspora is very active, and flights would facilitate the commercial and people-to-people ties between our two countries”.
Earlier this month, Air Serbia’s CEO, Duncan Naysmith, said the carrier is continuing to look at options to expand its long haul network but its main focus now is returning to normality following the market-wide disruption caused by the coronavirus pandemic. “Our biggest focus at this stage is getting back to some sort of normality. We continue to look at long haul destinations. We look at China, USA, and Canada as well. At this point in time we are counting on normality, but we always look for opportunities to expand our long haul flights”. The carrier’s General Manager for Commercial and Strategy, Jiri Marek, noted last week, “For us, it [long haul] is working pretty well, and we would like to develop that more in the future”.
Canada is one of Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport’s largest unserved markets, with 61.232 indirect passengers traveling between the two on a single ticket in 2019, based on OAG data. Flights between Belgrade and Toronto were the busiest citypair between the two countries. In 2019, Toronto was Belgrade Airport’s third busiest unserved route after Shanghai and Beijing, as well as the busiest in North America. Overall, there were 40.856 passengers travelling between the two cities. The majority of travellers flew in combination with Air Canada and Air Serbia, with passengers shuttled by the latter to several European points such as London Heathrow, Amsterdam and Zurich and then continued their journey with Canada’s national carrier. They were followed by LOT Polish Airlines, Lufthansa and Air France. The single most used feeder airport to and from Toronto was Warsaw with around 19% of passengers traveling on the route with LOT Polish Airlines through its hub.
Two-way indirect traffic between Belgrade and Canada in 2019
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