Growing pains

Things are really looking up. Enter the newly established state-owned Indonesian Flight Navigation Service, or AirNav Indonesia, which recently opened a brand new headquarters at Tangerang, Banten near Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta International Airport. Up-to-date, streamlined and raring to bring new efficiencies to the country’s airways, AirNav has already taken over the part of the air traffic system previously run by state-owned airport operators Angkasa Pura I and Angkasa Pura II. Through the rest of this year it will take control of navigation services from another 138 smaller airports currently managed by the Transportation Ministry’s technical management units (UPTs). By next year the Jakarta Automated Air Traffic System (JAATS) will also be integrated with the Makassar Air Traffic System Center (MATSC), which controls traffic in eastern Indonesia, to form a single system. And it has earmarked US$114 million to develop the country’s navigation system this year, lashing out on new navigation and communication equipment.

Having the country’s air traffic management all under the same roof should have been done years ago but better late than never. AirNav is certainly not letting the grass grow under its feet, young as the seedlings may be. President Director Ichwanul Idrus says by June the capacity of Soekarno-Hatta will also be increased from the current 64 flights an hour to 72. “We aim to further increase the capacity to 86 flights per hour by June 2015. However, we will need support in infrastructure, including a new rapid exit taxiway,” he explained.

It’s a move that is sorely needed. The airport was built to handle 23 million passengers annually and now has to cope with more than 50 million. Data from the Indonesian National Air Carriers Association (INACA) shows passenger traffic across Indonesia has been growing an average 15 per cent annually for several years, even outstripping the much more publicised growth taking place in China and India. Things are so bad the Ministry of Transport recently turned down requests from state-owned Garuda and budget AirAsia Indonesia to operate additional flights through Jakarta.

“The significant rate of growth in air transportation is currently not supported with adequate infrastructures, posing challenges for airline operators,” bemoaned the local AirAsia chief, Dharmadi.

Having the country’s air traffic management all under the same roof should have been done years ago but better late than never.

The situation is likely to worsen before it gets better. Open skies among member states of the Association of South East Asian Nations is due to arrive next year and this is expected to boost traffic even further. Air traffic forecasts for Indonesia project the number of annual passengers, which was 50 million in 2010, will rise to over 358 million by 2025, an average annual growth rate of 8. 5 per cent.

To be fair, however, the Indonesian government has recognised the problem and has made improvements to aviation infrastructure a top policy priority. Huge amounts of cash have already been earmarked to expand not only Soekarno-Hata but renovate and develop dozens of airports around the country. The only problem is none of it will be completed overnight and local and international airlines serving Indonesia are going to face congestion problems for some time to come.

There will be another benefit for Indonesia in the formation of AirNav. It should lead to Indonesia getting back a big portion of its airspace it hasn’t controlled since 1946. This is because Singapore controls the airspace within a 110nm radius of the city-state. As a result, Singapore’s flight information region extends over Indonesia’s territory, including Batam, Natuna and Dumai in the Riau Islands group. “We also aim that by 2016 we can propose to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) that we take over our airspace management from Singapore,” said the AirNav chief.

Of course Indonesia isn’t the only country in the Asia Pacific that faces immense challenges in developing its infrastructure and air navigation services to handle the massive increase in regional traffic expected over the next decade and more, particularly from the fast-growing low-cost carrier sector. There are now some 47 LCCs in the region, operating about 1,000 aircraft and accounting for 20 per cent of the region’s seat capacity. They now account for account for up to 50 per cent of future Asia Pacific aircraft orders, with more than 1,600 new aircraft on the way. Keeping ahead of their demands is an urgent priority for everyone.