The FINANCIAL — According to Today's Zaman, amid the troubling impact of the ongoing global financial crisis, only five out of 40 airports in Turkey have posted profits for 2008, while the remaining 35 recorded a loss, a report from the State Airports Management General Directorate (DHMİ) has shown.
İstanbul Atatürk Airport posted the highest profit, with TL 496 million in 2008, while Antalya International Airport came in second with a profit of TL 294 million. Muğla-Milas-Bodrum Airport came in third, with TL 32 million; Muğla-Dalaman Airport saw TL 25.7 million, and İzmir Adnan Menderes Airport recorded TL 3.7 million in profit. Ankara Esenboğa Airport was at the bottom of the list, with a TL 21 million loss.
According to the DHMİ's 2008 income and expenditure statistics, İstanbul Atatürk Airport earned TL 579 million in 2008 while its expenditures amounted to TL 83 million. Ankara Esenboğa Airport saw TL 39 million in income and TL 60 million in expenditures in 2008.
The number of passenger flying through Turkey's airports increased by 13 percent in 2008 over the preceding year to reach 79.4 million while air traffic jumped 7.7 percent and cargo traffic increased by 1.6 percent in the same period. İstanbul Atatürk Airport ranked first in terms of passengers, having seen a 23.1 percent increase in 2008 compared to 2007. The number of passengers to fly through İstanbul Atatürk Airport reached 28.5 million in 2008.
Speaking in İstanbul yesterday, DHMİ General Manager Orhan Birdal said the number of air passengers in Turkey increased by 6 percent in the January-April period of this year when compared to the same period of 2008, adding that he expects 2009 to prove relatively more profitable. Underlining that neither the current financial crisis nor the swine flu that recently emerged in Mexico and spread to a few countries had negatively affected Turkey's aviation sector, Birdal said Turkey may only lightly be affected. “We expect the sector to see further recovery with the arrival of the summer season,” he noted.
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