Passenger volume at Hong Kong International Airport fell 18.9% to 3.3 million in June on the same month last year, with cargo traffic also dropping 13.4% to 270,000 tonnes. Air traffic movements fell by 13.3%.

The falls were caused by the global fear sparked by the outbreak of H1N1. Visitor travel dropped 25%. Another reason was the continually weak global economy and flight reductions by airlines due to lower demand.

Cargo exports dropped 17%, mainly due to weak consumption markets in North America and Europe.

Airport Authority Chief Executive Officer Stanley Hui said today as people's concern over H1N1 recedes and the global economy stabilises he expects passenger traffic to see smaller declines and cargo volume to gradually recover.

He also said the year-on-year 13.4% drop in cargo throughput in June was noticeably smaller than the 20% decline recorded in recent months, which was smaller than the 30% reductions recorded at the end of last year and early this year.

For the first half of 2009 the Airport Authority handled 22.4 million passengers, 1.5 million tonnes of cargo and 138,290 aircraft movements, representing drops of 8.2%, 19.8% and 7.7% on the first half of last year.