Airports of Thailand, which manages six international airports including Bangkok’s gateways, saw non-aeronautical revenues surge by +22% in the nine months to June, almost double the traffic growth of +12.2% to 90m.

Passengers comprised 51.2m international and 38.8m domestic. Helping the growth was AOT’s official opening of Don Mueang International’s Terminal 2 for domestic flights which is boosting low-cost airline traffic.

For the nine-month period, non-aeronautical revenue hit THB16,247.56m/$468m (see chart below). The biggest component, concession revenue, added THB1,606.23/$46.3m or +18.6% to generate THB10,255.2m/£296m.

According to AOT, the main reason for the large rise was the increase in passenger numbers and the revenues sharing rate, especially from its duty free shops – mostly run by King Power International Group – which increased by THB 816.64m/$23.5m. That equates to 51% of the concession revenue rise.

TERRORISM YET TO IMPACT TRAVEL

Despite a recent spate of bomb attacks in southern Thailand – a year after the major bomb blast at the Erawan shrine in Bangkok – AOT sees a positive outlook as the tourism sector is still expanding, fuel prices are decreasing and it describes the domestic political situation is stable.

“These factors will increase the demand for air travel and have positive impact for the domestic aviation industry especially the continuous growth of low-cost airlines,” says AOT.

Currently, AOT is accelerating the process to revise the master plan of six airports including Suvarnabhumi Phase 2, Phuket International, and Don Mueang International. At Phuket, AOT is preparing for a full-service launch of the new international terminal, after all systems have passed their testing phase.