China's 130 airports lost 1.68 billion yuan in 2010

About 130 of the 175 domestic airports lost a combined 1.68 billion yuan, or 245 million U.S. dollars, last year, but Chinese airlines saw profits of 35.1 billion yuan, accounting for 60 percent of the profits of global airlines, said the director of the civil aviation regulator on Feb. 24, 2011.
"Airports are infrastructure to serve the public rather than make money, and the profits they can help generate are eight times the investments put into building them," Li Jiaxiang, director of Civil Aviation Administration of China, said.
The government is willing to subsidize airports as they shore up regional economies, and the CAAC provided subsidies of more than 6 billion yuan to regional airports from 2006 to 2010, Li said.
Last year, domestic airlines and airports tripled their profits to a record total of 43.7 billion yuan. Airlines earned profits of 35.1 billion yuan as they tapped major events, including the Shanghai Expo and the Guangzhou Asian Games.
Passenger numbers rose 15.8 percent from 192 million in 2009 to a record 267 million last year. Cargo turnover increased 25 percent from a year ago to 5.57 million tons in 2010.
Li also said during the 11th Five-Year Plan from 2006 to 2010, domestic carriers flew more than 1 billion passengers, an average annual increase of 14.1 percent. Investments in civil aviation were 1 trillion yuan in the period, Li said.
China will add more than 45 airports over the next five years, bringing the total to more than 220, Reuters reported.
China is in the midst of a major airport expansion, planning four major hubs in the country and developing aviation links to its poorer and more remote regions in the far west. Of the country's 175 existing airports, around 130 are in the red, with combined losses totaling 1.68 billion yuan last year, Li Jiaxiang said.
Air travel is developing rapidly in China amid a booming economy, bolstering the bottom lines of Air China, China Eastern Airlines and other carriers.
The combined fleet size of Chinese airlines is expected to jump to around 5,000 planes by the end of 2015, up from 2,600 units at the end of last year, Li said.