Chinese airports handled a combined 1.01 trillion passengers in 2016, an 11.1% increase from the year prior, according to 2016 Civil Airport Performance Statistics Bulletin released lately by Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC).

Cargo and mail throughput rose 3.9% to 14.1 million tonnes, while aircraft movements climbed 8% to 8.6 million.

Total Passenger Numbers Exceed 1 Trillion

Total passenger numbers increased 11.1% year on year to 1.01 trillion in 2016. Of those, domestic and international traffic accounted for 914 million and 100 million, up 10.3% and 19.3%, while regional passenger number declined 1.4% to 27.6 million.

Meanwhile, the total cargo & mail traffic volume at Chinese airports grew 7.2% to 15.1 million tonnes. With a year-on-year growth of 6.1%, the domestic cargo & mail traffic volume stood at 9.74 million tonnes. The Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan routes accounted for 936,000 tonnes, an decline of 4.2% from a year earlier, while international cargo increased 9.1% year on year to 5.36 million tonnes.

Aircraft movements registered a 7.9% yearly growth to 9.24 million in 2016, among which 7.93 million takeoffs and landings were cargo flights, up 8.8% year on year. Aircraft movements on domestic flights increased 7.1% year on year to 8.43 million, while that on international flights and Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan routes registered at 810,000 and 203,000, up 16.9% and down 2.8% respectively over a year earlier.

218 Civil Airports

In 2016, there were altogether 218 certificated civil airports in China, 8 more compared to a year ago, including 216 with scheduled services.

There were 28 airports that handled more than 10 million passengers, two more than in 2015. Airports that saw at least 2 million passengers numbered 21.

Last year, the 28 airports in 10 million passenger club accounted for 79.1% of total passenger traffic, the CAAC said. Airports in the main cities of Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou accounted for 26.1% of total passenger traffic.

Beijing Capital International Airport witnessed over 90 million passengers in 2016, while Shanghai served more than 100 million passengers via its two city airports.

By region, China's eastern airports accounted for 29% of passenger traffic, followed by central southern region (23.8%), southwest region (16.9%), northern region (15.3%), northwest (6.2%), northeast region (6.1%) and Xinjiang (2.7%).

In terms of cargo, there were 51 airports handling more than 10,000 tonnes of cargo and mail, accounting for 98.3% of total cargo traffic. Airports in the main cities of Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou accounted for 49.6% of the total. Geographically, China's eastern airports contributed 40.4% of cargo traffic, followed by central southern region (26.4%), northern region (15.8%), southwest region (10.2%), northeast region (3.5%), northwest (2.4%) and Xinjiang (1.2%).

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