The Philippines and United Arab Emirates agreed to expand their air service agreement (ASA) to serve the rising travel demand between the two countries.
“Last week, UAE and Philippine air talks were successful one. Both sides agreed to increase the flights of Emirates of Dubai from the current 18 flights a week in Manila to 21 flights in Manila,” said Carmelo Arcilla, executive director of the Civil Aeronautics Board on the sidelines of the 2023 Aviation Summit.
The air talks between the Philippine air panel and its counterpart in UAE were held on Sept. 19 to 20 in Cebu. The Philippine air services negotiating panel is composed of officials from the CAB, Departments of Transportation, Foreign Affairs and Tourism, as well as from Clark International Airport Corp. and local airline companies.
“This is on top of flights that they are making in Cebu and Clark which they committed to maintain for at least three years and hopefully beyond. So, they are under obligation to operate that because we are promoting our secondary gateway,” Arcilla said.
The memorandum of understanding (MoU) also includes the increase in air cargo from 200 to 600 tons per week for every national carrier and the operation of Airbus A380 aircraft. In exchange, the Philippines granted three flight entitlements between Manila and UAE.
“So far there were no requests from our local carriers, but we hope they will increase because the economy is recovering and there are more deployment of our workers and the UAE is one of the top destinations of our migration workers that supports the labor market in the UAE,” he said.