Regional organizations raise $14.9M to help EIA attract flights
A group of regional organizations is moving forward with a plan to attract direct international flights to Edmonton International Airport (EIA) using funds from the region's municipalities — despite coming just shy of the initial $15-million goal.
The air services opportunity fund, which is being managed by Edmonton Global, will provide cash incentives and help cover some of the setup and operating costs for airlines that agree to establish direct routes in and out of the airport.
"All the planes are allocated to other routes, either in North America or around the world," said Chris McLeod, Edmonton Global's vice president of global marketing and communications. "We basically have to lure those flights away from other communities, so we need a tool to sit down with the airlines and get them to pay attention."
EIA has been struggling over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic — in part because Edmonton was not selected by the federal government as one of the four ports of entry into Canada. The airport reported $128 million less in revenues in 2020 compared to 2019, and lost 39 of its 52 direct flights.
McLeod added that EIA also lost a number of national connections in the fallout, many of which are currently operating out of Calgary International Airport, which was selected as a port of entry.
Re-establishing some of these flights, as well as attracting new ones, is critical to the region's economy, McLeod said, both because airport activity contributes directly by supporting jobs, and because international flights help create economic opportunities by facilitating the movement of goods and people, which many industries depend on.
"About half the cargo that comes in and out of our region is in the belly of passenger planes," McLeod explained. "When we lost a connection to Europe through (KLM Royal Dutch Airlines), for example, it affected our food and agricultural sectors."
Even the region's flower stores, which rely on imports from countries such as the Netherlands, Ecuador, and Colombia, have been struggling with supply issues over the course of the pandemic.