Airline companies in Nigeria are currently in danger of folding up and it appears that it’s going to get really worse before any chance of getting better. The price of Jet-A1, also known as aviation fuel has increased tremendously over the last few months and the aviation industry simply cannot afford to keep aeroplanes in the sky for much longer. Previously, the International Air Transport Association had projected that the aviation industry would pick up pace in 2022 following two years of COVID-induced restrictions, the outbreak of war in Ukraine has created a scarcity of fuel products globally and the aviation industry is feeling the effects more than most.
According to Allen Onyeama, Vice President of the Airline Operators of Nigeria who is also the CEO of Air Peace, at least three airlines in Nigeria are on the verge of shutting down due to the high cost of jet fuel – which went from two hundred naira per litre to in excess of seven hundred. The week’s final episode of Business Edge discusses the current precarious state of Nigeria’s aviation sector as a result of the heightened cost of aviation fuel. Tolulope Adeleru-Balogun is with Dr Alexander Nwuba, President of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association of Nigeria.
The price of fuel is not peculiar to Nigeria by any means: most countries across the world are feeling the pinch. It has only become more intense in Nigeria over the past three months, due to a number of factors. These factors include the skyrocketing exchange rate between the naira and the US dollar in which most businesses in the world trade and with which these companies purchase fuel. And as expected, the war in Ukraine has contributed in no small measure to the crisis which was only just abating.
Watch Business Edge above.
