AIRBUS, Global Market Forecast, 2013.

 

With each successive Airbus Global Market Forecast (GMF) we seek to deliver a 20-year view of the demand for civil passenger and freighter aircraft that will serve as a reference for airlines, airports, investors, government and non-government agencies, air transport and

economic planners world-wide. We chose the title for this year’s GMF “Future Journeys” to remind us that, behind the data, the analysis and the predictions contained in our forecast, the community that constitutes the air transport industry essentially provides journeys. These journeys involve real people, each with their own particular reason to embark upon each journey.

Very soon after the fi rst fl ights of the early 1900s, flying became less about the challenge of flight itself and more about peoples’ journeys. As early as 1914 passenger fl ights were a regular occurrence and 1919 saw the creation of the fi rst airline that is still operating today.

People were quick to grasp the benefi ts aviation could bring to their journeys, beginning with the transport of high-value freight in the form of air mail. Aviation continued to innovate to facilitate this need with a succession of signifi cant airline fi rsts: across the Atlantic and Pacifi c in the nineteen thirties and the introduction of jet airliners in the fi fties. Technological and operational fi rsts have continued to this day and behind each of them are the demand of peoples’ lives and their journeys.

In this forecast we set out our view of the key economic and operational drivers of air transport markets in the next 20 years and their implications on the demand for passenger and freighter aircraft. But as in the past it is journeys, how they are performed, where they start and fi nish, when they happen and who will take them that will defi ne the future. This future will steer us all towards the areas of innovation that will defi ne the shape and structure of our industry at the end of this forecast’s coverage in 2032 and beyond. Our regular readers will notice some areas of greater focus in the 2013 GMF. It is our intent to provide you with analysis based on the most comprehensive sets of data and calling on the very best forecasting techniques to provide a useful source material for your own analyses. We realise, however, that there is always room for further improvement and we look forward to your feedback and your questions in order to make our future forecasts even more robust.