Archive

BY KATE REW
A FIVE-YEAR lease for Terminal 6 at New York’s John F Kennedy Airport has been signed by the New York-based, no-frills airline, JetBlue, which plans to start operating on November 1. The deal will allow the airline to increase the number of its gates from six to ten and double the volume of its potential operations.…

Keith Nuthall
URGENT action to boost airport security in the wake of the destruction of New York’s World Trade Centre has been ordered by the European Union Council of Ministers for transport.

In an emergency session held days after the tragedy, EU Member States agreed to implement “all the key measures in Document 30 of the European Civil Aviation Conference and said that even “these measures should be reviewed in the light of recent events.”…

BY SWINEETHA DIAS WICKRAMANAYAKE, in Columbo
AGREEMENT has been struck between the Japanese and Sri Lankan governments over funding for a SLRupees12 billion development project for the Bandaranaike International Airport (BIA), near Columbo, which was attacked by Tamil Tiger terrorists this summer.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Bank for Reconstruction and Development has developed plans to lend US$25 million to develop Atyrau Airport, in western Kazakhstan, near the Caspian Sea. It wants to lend the money to the Atyrau Airport Company, which is wholly owned by KazTransOil, the state oil transport company.…

BY SWINEETHA DIAS WICKRAMANAYAKE
TAIWANESE authorities have decided to spend more than NT$ 3 billion on upgrading Kaohsiung international airport in western Taiwan, as well as its seaport facilities. The plan has been announced by the country’s Economic Development Council and includes lengthening runways.…

Keith Nuthall
FURTHER details have emerged about the effect on the international automobile industry of China’s recently approved membership of the World Trade Organisation. According to an EU briefing paper obtained by just-auto.com, China has made significant steps to liberalise its auto trade, a statement that contrasts with the pessimistic tone of an earlier WTO paper, which said that tariff protection would remain high after it formally joins the trade body, probably next March.…

Keith Nuthall
CHINA was due today (Monday) to be granted membership of the World Trade Organisation, following 15 years of often intense negotiations, although its automobile industry is to retain a significant level of tariff protection.

After implementing all the promises it has made in the bilateral deals which paved the way for WTO membership, China’s average bound tariff level for industrial goods will drop to 8.9 per cent, with a range from 0 to 47 per cent.…

BY MONICA DOBIE, in Montreal
THE FORD Motor Company of Canada has announced that its newly launched national online auto shopping service experiment has proved to be so successful, that it and will extend the service to all 532 of its dealers across Canada.…

BY SWINEETHA DIAS WICKRAMANAYAKE
RESEARCH studies released by the Confederation of Japan Automobile Workers Unions have predicted that there will be 143,000 fewer workers in the domestic automobile industry in 2005 compared with 2000, if Japanese auto sales continue to slump and if automobile and autoparts makers shift more production overseas.…

Keith Nuthall
SIR RICHARD Branson, speaking as chairman of the Internet car sales company VirginCars, has called for the end of the block exemption in car distribution in the EU, saying this would led to an average 5 per cent cut in new car prices and give “greater leverage to the consumer.”…