Smarter regulations, global standards and infrastructure needed, IATA tells government

IATA has called for governments to facilitate the growth of global connectivity by avoiding creeping re-regulation, maintaining the integrity of global standards and addressing a capacity crisis.

The call came in the IATA Director General’s Report on the Air Transport Industry at the 74^th IATA Annual General Meeting and World Air Transport Summit in Sydney.

“Smarter regulation needs to counter the trend of creeping re-regulation. Global standards must be maintained by the states that agreed them. And we need to find efficient solutions to the looming capacity crisis,” summarised Alexandre de Juniac, IATA’s director general and CEO.

A creeping trend of re-regulation puts the gains of deregulation – which began in 1978 and ignited the spread of air transport’s benefits – at risk. Citing regulatory actions from around the world, de Juniac noted that regulatory over-reach now includes attempts to prescriptively regulate passenger compensation, seat assignments, the ticket options that can be offered to consumers and prices charged for various ancillary services.

“Regulations must add value. In assessing that, regulators must recognise the power of competition and social media to safeguard consumer interests. Governments should not distort market effectiveness with regulations that second-guess what consumers really want,” said de Juniac.

This is the spirit of IATA’s “smarter regulation” campaign which asks governments to align with global standards, take into account industry input and analyse the costs of regulation against the benefits.

Calling for a “vigorous defence of global standards”, IATA provided examples of how standards have been sidelined, including India’s taxation of international tickets in contravention of ICAO resolutions, and states planning new environment taxes even as the ICAO-brokered Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA) is about to commence as the global market-based measure for managing emissions.

Moreover, IATA highlighted that the Montreal Convention 1999 still has not been universally ratified nearly two decades after it was drafted. Its modernisations apply in only 130 states. There is also not 100 per cent compliance with Chicago Convention Annex 13 requirements for complete accident investigations. Of the approximately 1,000 accidents over the last decade only about 300 accident investigations have been concluded with published reports.

In addition, Annex 17 of the Chicago Convention sets baseline security requirements, and yet ICAO audits reveal that only 28 per cent of states meet them. Moreover, 37 per cent of states fail on resolutions of security concerns.

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