Consumers have grown more cautious about flying, making the return of air travel “slow and shallow”, according to airline association Iata.
A majority of air travellers will wait six months or longer before taking a flight, research by Iata suggests.
Brian Pearce, Iata chief economist, warned: “We are going to see a relatively slow and shallow return of air travel until we see either a vaccine or easily available tests.
“Consumers have grown more cautious in the last month. A majority say they are going to wait six months or more.”
Speaking on a World Aviation Festival webcast, Pearce said: “Consumers have also changed their booking behaviour which makes it difficult for airline network planners. They are booking much, much later.”
Pearce noted airline capacity in China, Vietnam and South Korea “is about 25% below where it was last year, at least in terms of flights” and said: “We’ve passed the low point [of the crisis].
“There are some positive signs. Business confidence rebounded to some extent in May. We are starting to see some bilateral arrangements of travel bubbles and travel corridors.”
But he said: “We are nowhere near over the first wave of the virus and it’s quite possible we could see a second wave.
“The fear of governments and health authorities is of importing Covid-19.”
Pearce insisted: “First and foremost this is a health crisis [and] the future of air travel is going to depend on what happens to the Covid-19 virus and on governments’ response.
“We are not going to see the sort of recovery we have seen after previous pandemics. It’s going to be some time before we see a widespread opening of borders.”
Iata does not expect a recovery to 2019 levels before 2023 and Pearce said “a second wave could lead to another quarter of lockdown and mean we will not see a return to 2019 levels until 2024”.
He warned: “It is going to be particularly difficult for long-haul travel. Bookings are very low and late. Visibility is almost zero. Cargo is the only bright spot.
“We will see countries negotiate bilateral agreements with their neighbours.”
He added: “There is a risk city-pair connections may not fully recover. Probably more than 90% of city pairs around the world are connected via hubs, but so many feeder markets remain closed.
“We forecast the number of connected city pairs around the world will probably be 25% lower than it was. Airlines are going to be a lot smaller.”