Kyrgyzstanis will no longer need a weighty reason to fly to Russia and other EAEU countries in the near future. A lot of transformations have taken place in the air traffic between the two states, about which a well-known expert in the field of civil aviation, Aidar Okenov, told 24.kg news agency in detail.
— Aidar Taalaibekovich, the last time we met was in January. The situation was difficult. What has changed during this time?
— One of the most important changes concerned prices.
Let’s take flights from Bishkek to Moscow as an example. In January, the price for this direction was $ 515. Now it has dropped to $ 397. Osh — Moscow air ticket cost $ 544, now it costs $ 429.
That is, prices fell by about 20 percent. If we compare them with the period before introduction of coronavirus restrictions, they are still high, of course, but there is an overall trend of their decline.
— What is it connected with?
— First of all, airlines have opened a large number of regional flights in Russia. Let me remind you that the Russian Federation allows airlines to operate only two charter flights from any city per week. To skirt the restriction, air carriers began to open flights to new cities. This led to an increase in the volume of air travel, and the average tariff began to fall. Laws of the market worked.
— How many flights are operated from Kyrgyzstan to Russia to date?
— A total of 90 flights a week, including regular — there are six of them — and charter ones. At least 38 flights depart from Bishkek, 41 — from Osh and 11 flights — from Tamchy.
By the way, as for positive changes, if earlier the airport in Tamchy was open only two months a year, in summer, now it has become a full-fledged international airport.
Today you can fly from it to eight cities of Russia — Moscow, St. Petersburg, Rostov-on-Don, Samara, Ufa, Mineralnye Vody, Yekaterinburg, Novosibirsk. There are forecasts that it will have a positive influence on increase in tourist flows in the summer.
— Is it possible that prices will continue to fall when new directions are opened?
— I can say that all possible additional directions have already been opened in Russia to date. The airlines have done everything they could in this regard.
The only thing that can improve the situation is the removal of restrictions according to which the airline is allowed to operate only two flights a week in one direction from one airport.
— Russia has suspended flights with Turkey due to a surge in the incidence of coronavirus. We also observe an increase in the number of cases ...
— The situation with Turkey is, of course, a bad indicator. It all depends on the epidemic situation in Kyrgyzstan, on how and in what direction it will continue to develop. We can only hope that we will not be included in the list of countries that Russia considers dangerous.
— The EAEU countries cancel presence of weighty reasons, replacing them with the application Travel without COVID-19. What is it?
— To a large extent, this became possible thanks to bilateral negotiations with the Russian government. Travel without COVID-19 app is a step towards elimination of mandatory presence of reasons for air travel. All you need is to install the application on your smartphone and register in it. Having done the PCR test, you have to scan the QR code. The information is automatically entered into the database. This will be your reason for travel. This is a very important and positive development.
— How soon will airlines stop demanding reasons from passengers traveling to Russia?
— It is planned that within the next ten days all airlines will completely switch to using the application. About 30 percent of passengers are already using it.
— The main reason for abandoning presence of reasons practice was their massive falsification. Will the application not suffer the same fate?
— Indeed, mandatory presence of weighty reasons has become a very profitable business for certain citizens. This will not work with the application, since it will not be possible to use fake PCR tests in it. In addition, all information is encrypted in the QR code — where, when and at what time you have underwent testing. It will be easy to check this.
— Certain problems have already arisen during introduction of Travel without COVID-19 app in Kyrgyzstan...
— The main problem was that only two state laboratories were presented there. Huge queues of those wishing to undergo the testing and fly to Russia using a new, simplified procedure formed. A few days ago, all private laboratories were added to Travel without COVID-19. This, by the way, is another guarantee — not a single sane laboratory will go for falsification of tests, because this will entail its exclusion from the project and more serious consequences.
— If we follow the logic, then after cancellation of presence of reason practice, the number of those wishing to fly to Russia will increase and this will again lead to an increase in ticket prices ...
— This is to be expected. You have rightly noticed that those who previously had no reason to fly will try to take the opportunity. This will influence the demand and increase in airfares. But I assure you that there will not be a sharp rise in prices and it will not last long. Self-regulation of prices will take place as soon as the excitement subsides.
