Africa-Press – Uganda. Entebbe International Airport has registered a decline in the number of daily passengers with an average of 1978 passengers per day in July compared to 5412 passengers per day before the second wave of Covid-19.
According to the Uganda Civil Aviation Authority spokesperson, Mr Vianney Luggya, the airport recorded a total of 61,328 international passengers in July 2021, which was a drop from 75472 passengers recorded in June 2021 and 77063 passengers recorded in May as well as 85054 passengers that were earlier on recorded in April 2021.
He added that in specific terms, an average of 1978 passengers per day were recorded through Entebbe international Airport in July 2021 in comparison to the 5412 passengers per day that the airport used to record before the advent of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2019.
“So, the rate of travel is still far away from where it was. It had somehow picked up in April 2021 when we recorded the 85054 and this is the month in which the airport has so far recorded the biggest number of passengers since resumption of commercial operations in October 2020 after a six-month closure. However the second wave that spread across the world in the run up to May and the associated enhanced restrictions on travel seem to have impacted traffic across the globe leading to a drop in passenger numbers in May, June and July at Entebbe International Airport,” Mr Luggya noted.
He, however, added that August presents a ray of hope with UAE which is one of the most popular destinations having partially eased travel restrictions by permitting transit passengers from Uganda.
“UAE recently eased travel restrictions from Uganda to UAE by permitting transit passengers and passengers to UAE who have resident permits, as long as they undertake another COVID-19 test four hours prior to their flight. The transit passengers through UAE do not have to undertake the second test as long as they have a negative PCR test result that meets their final destination requirements,” Mr Luggya said.
On the side of cargo, Mr Luggya said: “We are this year registering more exports than imports with 3380 metric tonnes of exports recorded in July in comparison to 2491 imports in the same month. A total of 5871 metric tonnes of cargo were recorded in July in comparison to 5148 metric tonnes of cargo recorded in June 2021, 5329 metric tonnes recorded in May, 5725 metric tonnes recorded in April, 5977 tonnes in March, 4766 in February and 4911 tonnes recorded in January 2021.”
