- Dar es Salaam will be Etihad Airways’ 110th destination globally, and its 11th destination in Africa and the Indian Ocean.
Etihad Airways, the national airline of the
United Arab Emirates, will expand its African route network with the launch of
a daily service to Dar es Salaam, the largest city in Tanzania.
Flights
between Abu Dhabi and Dar es Salaam, which commence on 1 December 2015, will be
operated using Airbus A320 aircraft with 16 Business Class and 120 Economy
Class seats.
Dar es
Salaam will be Etihad Airways’ 110th destination
globally, and its 11th destination in Africa and the
Indian Ocean. The daily schedule will offer two-way connectivity over Etihad
Airways’ hub in Abu Dhabi, with convenient onward connections to 45 popular
destinations across the Middle East, Europe, the Indian Subcontinent, North and
Southeast Asia, and Australasia.
In particular, it is anticipated that the demand
for the new route will be boosted by strong flows of business and leisure
travellers, as well as cargo volumes, between the East Africa region and the
Indian Subcontinent and China.
James Hogan, President and Chief Executive
Officer of Etihad Airways, said: “Dar es Salaam is an important new route on
Etihad Airways’ global network. It builds upon our existing presence in Africa,
and supports the close trading relationship between the United Arab Emirates
and Tanzania.”
The UAE is the primary trade partner of Tanzania
in the GCC region. Between 2007 and 2012, trade between UAE and Tanzania
increased by more than 350 per cent to US$761 million.
“Africa has one of the world’s fastest growing
regional economies, and the launch of this new route also enhances access and
the two-way flow of trade and tourism between the continent and key
destinations across our global network, supports inbound tourism, encourages
investment, and provides much needed local employment,” he added.
Tanzania has the sixth largest population in
Africa (51 million), with over four million people living in the largest city,
Dar es Salaam. The large proportion of the community consist of market traders
and proprietors of small businesses whose families originated from the Middle
East and Indian Subcontinent—areas of the world with which the settlements of
the Tanzanian coast have had long-standing trading relations.
The country is also developing quickly, and
currently has around US$19 billion in transport and utilities infrastructure
projects being planned. China is playing a key role in financing these major
projects, and is fast becoming the East African country’s leading trade
partner, with trade between the two countries growing to US$3.7 billion in
2013.
In 2013, Tanzania was also named one of the
world’s most sought after destinations for leisure travellers, and is blessed
with numerous national and international tourist attractions including Mt.
Kilimanjaro, the wildlife-rich national parks of the Serengeti, and the spice
island of Zanzibar.
Tanzania has the second largest economy in East
Africa, and Dar es Salaam provides a strategic gateway for the transportation
of goods and commerce to the surrounding six land-locked countries of Zambia,
Malawi, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi
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