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EUROCONTROL 3-year Forecast 2022-2024

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New short-term forecast covering 2022 to 2024

EUROCONTROL has released a short-term forecast, showing that 9.5 million flights are expected in the network this year (85% of 2019 levels), despite the impact of the invasion of Ukraine and global economic challenges.

This traffic forecast, which covers the period until the end of 2024, updates the previous forecast prepared in October 2021. It is based on:

  • recent European traffic trends (until April 2022),
  • the latest available economic forecast (Oxford Economics, May 2022),
  • a revision of the existing three scenarios accounting for COVID-19 impact and timing of recovery and the impact of Ukraine’s invasion by Russia;
  • no re-opening of the routes currently closed because of the conflict between Ukraine and Russia.

The Base scenario is considered as the most-likely scenario. For 2022, this scenario envisages about 9.5 million flights – corresponding to 85% of 2019. This is slightly below the level expected in the previous forecast publication for 2022 (89%) – largely as a result of the Omicron variant’s impact on the first quarter. It is now expected that the recovery to 2019 levels will take place during 2024, with the baseline scenario indicating 10.6 million flights in 2023, 5% down on 2019. However, there are still significant risks surrounding the forecast, not least as a result of rapidly-evolving events.

The Low scenario considers the impact of several downside risks, such as lingering/renewed effects of COVID-19 variants and economic risks (including high energy prices and a long term drop in people’s propensity to fly). In this scenario, we expect the recovery to 2019 levels to be delayed until after 2027.

EUROCONTROL 3-year forecast for *Europe 2022-2024
Actual and future IFR movements, % traffic compared to 2019

*Europe = ECAC 44 Member States
Source: EUROCONTROL, 3-year Forecast, June 2022

The traffic forecast shows wide variation between States, with some Southern Europe states already reaching their 2019 levels before the end of 2022. The invasion of Ukraine is having a limited impact at European level but the re-routings to avoid closed airspaces are affecting the number of overflights in various countries, notably Lithuania, Poland, Estonia and Latvia (fewer overflights); Armenia, Albania and Bosnia-Herzegovina (more overflights).

The next 7-year forecast update is scheduled for Autumn 2022.

Download EUROCONTROL's 2022-2024 forecast

Learn more about our updated scenarios for recovery from COVID-19 and Russian invasion of Ukraine

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