The Slovenian government has dropped plans to establish a new national carrier using European Union funds. The Ministry for Economic Development and Technology confirmed the draft of Slovenia’s Recovery and Resilience Plan, which must be approved by the European Commission in order for it to allocate the country 1.6 billion euros in grants and 3.6 billion in repayable funds to soften the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic, no longer contains a proposal to co-finance a new flag carrier. European officials previously expressed concerns over plans to allocate 76 million euros towards the creation of a new national airline.

The Ministry noted that plans to finance a new airline were not in line with the European Union’s green policies. "As aviation has not yet switched to renewable energy sources and predominately uses fossil fuels, this principle could not be met. As a result, we have withdrawn the proposal and we are currently trying to find a solution to obtain an alternative source of funding", the Ministry told the “Delo” daily. Slovenia saw the greatest decline in commercial flights in Europe last year after Georgia, impacted both by the coronavirus pandemic and also the collapse of former national airline Adria Airways in late 2019.

Meanwhile, the Minister for Economic Development and Technology, Zdravko Počivalšek, has held talks with Air Serbia’s General Manager for Commercial and Strategy, Jiri Marek. “They discussed possibilities to cooperate in improving Slovenia’s connectivity with the world. Due to the disclosure of confidential business information, we cannot comment on this matter”, the Ministry told “Delo”. According to the daily, Air Serbia has expressed interest in establishing a base in Ljubljana.

Air Serbia was the third busiest transfer airline in the Slovenian capital in 2020, improving its position on 2019, when it was the eighth busiest. The Serbian carrier managed to increase its transfer market share in Ljubljana from 4% in 2019 to 10% in 2020. Contributing to its improved performance was the collapse of Adria Airways, as well as it being one of the few carriers to have maintained operations to Ljubljana for the majority of last year, with most airlines temporarily suspending operations. In 2020, some 51% of all travellers on Air Serbia’s Ljubljana route were transfers. In 2019, they made up some 22.4% of all passengers. Last year, inbound and outbound travellers from Ljubljana flying with Air Serbia connected most onto flights to or from Skopje, while in 2019 Athens was most popular.