Air Serbia police za Guangzhou

Air Serbia will commence operations to its second destination in China and fourth long-service on September 30. As EX-YU Aviation News learns, sales for the inaugural flight have been performing strongly, both with point to point and transfer traffic, particularly from Guangzhou to Western Europe. Air Serbia believes the Chinese market has a lot of potential, and it is also seeking to benefit from cargo operations with a Free Trade Agreement between Serbia and China going into effect today. Under the agreement, approximately 90% of the products traded between the two countries will be exempt from tariffs, while over 60% of them will enjoy zero tariffs as the agreement goes into effect. "The Free Trade Agreement between Serbia and China will unlock new cargo opportunities and even a segment of corporate travel. It is such a big market that there is an opportunity to grow more", Air Serbia's CEO, Jiri Marek said recently.

Late last month, Air Serbia’s management toured China, taking part in various meetings and conferences in Guangzhou, Shanghai, and Tianjin. Although Guangzhou Airport initially announced that Air Serbia would serve the city once per week, complementing China Southern Airlines, which will launch two weekly rotations on the same route, the Serbian carrier has scheduled a two weekly service between the two cities, with its third Airbus A330-200 aircraft to go into maintenance this week in preparation for its delivery to the airline.

Air Serbia is currently limited to operating three destinations in China, with the carrier planning to commence Shanghai at the end of the year. Its first Chinese service, to Tianjin, which commenced in December 2022, will continue to operate. “We launched Tianjin during Covid. There was no other option available to fly to China at the time due to the pandemic. Since those flights became profitable from day one, we don’t have the need to change to somewhere else at the moment”, Mr Marek, said last month. During the carrier’s presentation in Tianjin late last week, the carrier said it transported over 33.500 passengers on the Tianjin route since its launch with the current cabin load factor exceeding 90%.