ACI World Forecasts Passenger Traffic in Africa to Reach 261 Million in 2025

Airports Council International (ACI) World released the “annual World Airport Traffic Forecasts (WATF) 2023­–2052 dataset, showing the Top 20 markets for air travel demand among other key air traffic findings.”

According to the data, “Passenger traffic in the Africa region is estimated to reach 219 million passengers in 2023 and 242 million passengers in 2024, the latter surpassing the 2019 level (106% of 2019). The region is expected to reach 261 million in 2025.”

ACI World says “The latest WATF extends its horizon by an impressive 10 years, offering a comprehensive 30-year perspective on airport traffic forecasts at global, regional, and country levels. The flagship resource covers data sourced from 141 countries, introducing 29 new countries, to provide granular forecasts for passengers, air cargo volumes (in metric tonnes) and aircraft movements.”

ACI World Director General Luis Felipe de Oliveira said: “The projections indicate that global passenger traffic is set to reach 9.7 billion by the end of 2024, surpassing pre-pandemic levels, and suggest a doubling by 2042 and a 2.5-fold increase by 2052. In the long-term, the global passenger market dynamic is expected to transition from advanced economies towards emerging and developing ones as they experience significant urbanization and population increases, often combined with rapid economic growth favourably impacting their disposable income and willingness to travel. Investing responsibly in current and new infrastructure remains key to ensuring that we can sustainably meet capacity growth to maximize the social and economic benefits of aviation.”

Top 20 markets by total passenger traffic forecast