Africa remained the most toured region in 2010, the year of recovery for Tourism. Though, many airlines are now investing more in Far East Asia and Korea, as new and rising tourism destinations. Some airlines are also increasing flight frequencies to China and Australia being stronger economies. However, East Africa also seems to be rising on the map.
In 2011, Qatar Airways (QR) the award winning, worlds first five star rated airline is increasing its flights to East African regions. The airline is ‘making the most of’ steady business growth and popularity of tourism in Tanzania and East Africa. Qatar Airways will be offering additional flights to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania as well as flights to Nairobi, the capital of Kenya.
Last few years record show that Qatar’s flights to Tanzania have done exceptionally well in business that has encouraged the airline to invest more in this route through increasing number of flights in 2011. Qatar operates daily flights to Dar es Salaam and has received an additional four flights a week from January 2, this year. Plus, the additional flight is scheduled to commence from February 14 to raise its flight frequency up to 12 weekly services.
Qatar Airways has marked the Tanzania and Kenya, as its strategic destinations in 2011 and raising its flight frequency to 12 flights a week, in this region. Due to its strong presence in UK, Qatar Airways is also a ‘first choice’ carrier for Kenyan students and immigrants in UK who travel in and out of the country every holiday season. At present, flights to Nairobi, the capital of Kenya are a prime focus of the national airline of Kenya, Kenya Airways that also offers code share flights to many other destinations along with KLM and Air France Alliance.
Qatar’s Chief Executive Officer Akbar Al Baker stated: "We have been serving Nairobi since November 2005, and this has proved one of our biggest success stories in Africa, so we are extremely pleased to be offering our passengers even more choice with additional frequency going to double daily,"
He further added: “We are pleased to introduce additional capacity to Africa and offer the traveling public greater options for air travel to and from the region,"
The carrier offers flights from all major airports of UK including departures from Manchester as well as London Heathrow and the schedule involves a touchdown in Doha, the Middle Eastern headquarter of Qatar Airways. Doha is the capital city of Qatar the homeland of the carrier. Qatar’s both routes are operated with an A320 aircraft, featuring 12 seats in Business Class and 132 Economy seats.
Qatar Airways’ is one of the top and most demanded airline for flights to Africa. Its popular routes include flights to Johannesburg, Alexandria, Algiers, Cairo, Luxor, Casablanca, Cape Town, Khartoum, Lagos, Nairobi, Dar es Salaam, Seychelles, Tripoli, and Tunis in African continent.
