The airfield light system, costing over Rs 170 million, has been installed at Sialkot International Airport (SIA) to enable the Boeing 747 planes land at the airport. Talking to reporters at Sialkot International Airport on Friday, SAI Chief Executive Khawar Anwar Khwaja said the installation of lighting system would enhance the chances of starting cargo flights this year.
Khawar Khwaja said the country's longest runway, measuring 3.6 kilometres, had been completed, providing landing and take-off facilities to Boeing 747 and other aircraft in bad weather, while the construction work on passengers terminal would be executed shortly.
Khawar said that according to a rough estimate, over 10,000 exporters of Sialkot besides a large number of exporters and other passengers of Gujrat, Narowal, Hafizabad, Mandi Bahauddin, Wazirabad, Jehlum and Mirpur (Azad Kashmir) would be benefited with the completion of this mega project.
The regular functioning of the airport would not only accelerate the pace of trade and commerce activities, but would also help enhance the export volume to manifold and likely to generate wide employment opportunities in the area, he foresees.
The SIA chief executive said that the airport would, undoubtedly, bring a revolutionary change in the socio-economic development of the region. With the merging of dry port, export processing zone and now airport at Sialkot, the importance of the area would further enhance, which would ultimately help substantial increase in the exports from the area in future, he added.
According to a rough estimate, 60 percent of aircraft movement will be for domestic purpose, while 40 percent would be for the international carriers.
The potential traffic forecast for SIA is scaled down at the time of opening to 472,000 passengers a year, while estimated cargo tonnage at the time of opening is expected to be 24,000 tons. By the end of year 2012, about 53,000 tones of cargo will be lifted from Sialkot International Airport.