HONG KONG: Air Canada will increase direct flights between China and Canada from December, the news arm of China’s aviation regulator said on Wednesday, after Ottowa last week removed a 2022 limit on how many services Chinese carriers could fly to Canada.
CAAC News, the official newspaper of the Civil Aviation Administration of China, said the increased flights between China and Canada would bolster trade and their economies and promote further recovery of China-Canada air transport.
Flights between Canada and China did not ramp back up after COVID-era travel restrictions ended and are around 90% lower today than in 2019.
Air Canada, which currently flies four times a week from Vancouver to Shanghai, will operate seven flights a week from Dec. 7 and will resume flying every day from Vancouver to Beijing from Jan. 15, 2025, CAAC news said.
Chinese airlines are accelerating applications for additional flights, the article added. Air Canada did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Air space challenge
In 2019 Air Canada was flying up to 35 times a week to China - including from Toronto - while Chinese carriers operated 76 direct round-trip flights, Cirium flight schedule data shows. China in 2022 all but shut its borders to travellers due to a zero COVID policy and suspended many inbound flights.
Canada in February 2022 said Chinese carriers could fly only six round trips a week into Canada, and there could be no direct flights between Canada and Beijing.
These restrictions were lifted on Friday, a Canadian Transportation Agency order said. Canadian carriers are at a disadvantage to Chinese carriers because they have not been able to fly over Russian air space since the outbreak of war in Ukraine in 2022.
This makes Canadian flights to China out of Toronto, in Canada’s east, commercially unattractive due to the extended flight time. Chinese carriers have continued to take shorter northern routes to Europe and North America over Russia’s vast airspace and have over time gained market share from non-Chinese carriers due to this competitive advantage.
Frictions
Despite the continued frictions over trade, Canada this year had agreed to stabilise bilateral ties with China, committing to “pragmatic” engagement with the world’s second-largest economy.
Beijing has also agreed to normalise relations with Ottawa, after Canadian Foreign Minister Melanie Joly’s July visit to China, the first by a Canadian foreign minister in seven years.
Bilateral relations, established in 1970, turned icy in 2018 after Huawei’s Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou was arrested in Canada and China subsequently arrested two Canadians in China. All three were later released, but Ottawa’s allegations of Chinese interference in Canada have kept relations strained.
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Both countries have seen heightened trade friction in recent months after Canada said it was “absolutely” considering banning Chinese-made software in EVs, among measures to counter what it calls overcapacity and a security threat.
Beijing in September launched an anti-discrimination investigation amongst restrictive measures taken by Canada, including additional tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, steel and aluminium products.
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