HKIA's passenger trips climbed 14.5% to 4.7m in February

But cargo volume declined.

Passenger trips and air traffic movements at Hong Kong International Airport in February rose 14.5% and 4.1% year-on-year, to 4.7 million and 27,665, while cargo volume dropped 13.3% to 248,000 tonnes.

The Airport Authority reported 9.3 million passengers and 582,000 tonnes of cargo for January and February, up 3.8% and 3.6% year-on-year. Flight movements grew 4.2% to 57,955.

The overall growth of passenger volume in January and February was mainly driven by visitor traffic, which registered growth of 5% over the same period last year, while South East Asia, the Mainland and Taiwan performed particularly well.

The overall growth of cargo throughput for the first two months was mainly attributed to an 11% year-on-year increase in transshipments. Taiwan and North America outperformed other key regions.

The authority’s Chief Executive Officer Stanley Hui said cargo recorded slower tonnage in February due to the closure of Mainland factories during the holiday period.

“We expect that cargo will gradually stabilise in the coming months as factories resume operations and we remain cautiously optimistic for the cargo growth in longer run,” he said.

On a rolling 12-month basis, the airport's passenger throughput rose 4.2% to 56.8 million. Cargo volume and aircraft movements went up 3.1% and 4.8% to 4.05 million tonnes and 354,035.