The Slovenian government is drafting a law which will enable airlines to be granted financial aid for the introduction of new routes or the growth in frequencies on existing services. It is part of the country’s bid to improve its air connectivity. Although Slovenia has provided financial incentives to airlines to maintain their operations to the country over the past two years, they were funded from the European Union’s aid package aimed at alleviating the negative financial impact of the coronavirus pandemic. With access to the EU’s emergency fund coming to an end, the government is looking at ways to legally support carriers flying to Ljubljana or wishing to introduce services to the Slovenian capital.
The Slovenian Ministry for Economic Development and Technology told the “Večer” daily, “The basis of the new law is the EU’s guidelines on state aid for airlines and airports, which constitute a legal framework for aid to be distributed to carriers in line with the bloc’s rules and regulations. Aid may be granted under the new law for the establishment of new routes or for the increase in frequencies on existing routes connecting Slovenia's airports to EU member states or possibly to third countries”. The law is expected to be passed by parliament in the coming months and a new public call for airlines issued in the spring. As previously reported, an emphasis will be put on specific routes in the region.
Over the past two years, Lufthansa, as Slovenia’s busiest airline, has been the biggest beneficiary of financial incentives provided by the government. The German carrier pocketed 1.7 million euros over the two-year period. It was followed by Turkish Airlines, which has received 1.01 million euros, then Air Serbia, which has been the recipient of 569.280 euros, followed by Air France, which has been granted 494.550 euros, Swiss International Air Lines, which has been given 369.300 euros, Wizz Air 348.492 euros, LOT Polish Airlines 341.971 euros, Brussels Airlines 325.809 euros, easyJet 190.149 euros, Air Montenegro 131.130 euros and Flydubai, as the latest entrant on the Slovenian market, has been granted 110.880 euros.
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They will do anything to avoid setting up a flag carrier.
ReplyDeleteYes and the concerned taxpayer brigade will be more than happy to finance LH's shit*y service with THEIR money.
DeleteThis is much cheaper and more effective than setting up a new airline.
DeleteNo it is not. Adria was able to maintain near zero loss/profit bakance, untill different lobbying groups within the company started to influence the decision making process, like buying and not leasing two A319 with 6 spare engines. Throwing apeox 5mio € to feed foreign airliners is helicopter money for somebody else. Adria generated a lot of tourist flow, especially congress tourism and it connected Slovenia with different parts of Europe. Now you have five, six destination countries. Besides, AA was paying taxes to Slovenia. So you can cut the crap with saying now things are better off for Slovenia. And another thing: national carrier was also major aviation engine in Slivenia, with AA gone, the knowledge is slowly disapearing. I know and can se it, I work in aviation industry. I hope you are happy now.
Delete@notLufthansa. Adria had 150 million € debt when it was sold to 4K under dubious conditions. It also had around the same amount of debt when it went bankrupt.
DeleteHehe, that was fast. :)
DeleteNotLufthansa - unfortunately you are wrong
DeleteBasically every commercial airline flying to Slovenia is subsidized?
ReplyDeleteEveryone but Transavia by the looks of it.
DeleteThe subsidies are peanuts.
DeleteInterestingly, Transavia didn't apply for any of the subsidies.
DeleteThey couldn't be bothered.
DeleteThe subsidies are not peanuts. The scope of flying to Slovenia would de identical also without these so for what the subsidies serve, they are way too high.
DeleteIf they gave ADRIA Airways this amount of money every year, they would get a way superior air connectivity for the money.
More and more countries seem to be resorting to subsidies
DeleteA general observation for the continent actually: Covid relief is coming to an end, and with a even more restricitive monetary policy from the ECB I am curious what lies ahead for airports and carriers who have a significant part of their revenues based on subsidies and I am not optimistic.
ReplyDeleteI don't think this will be felt immediately, but mid-term, around the latter part of 2023 I believe we will start hearing not so go things about the above mentioned. Carriers were struggling even before the pandemic, when money was abundant with 0 % interest rates.
Surely this opens up the possibility of LLC hub?
ReplyDeleteNot if the government plans to pick and choose which destinations should be subsidised.
DeleteRome, Spain and Scandinavia please
ReplyDeleteRome won't happen becouse of the triple daily flights from Trieste but I really think Madrid and Barcelona would work well. And I can't believe that there is still no connections with Copenhagen or Stockholm and maybe even Oslo as there is pretty big demand.
DeleteYep most probably as there are OU and Wizz Air out of ZAG too.
DeleteBut Vueling to BCN and Wizz Air to VLC would be cool and IB to MAD. But IB maybe with the CR9 and all SUTT with 3-4 weekly flights, so u can connect thru MAD.
AZ should also connect YU better via FCO. I like to see the South of Europe using more of its potential. Why always fly via AMS, LHR or FRA? MAD FCO BEG ATH IST can do it too. BEG is on a good way already, TK connects ex YU very well too. So lets hope we will see more AZ and IB in the future
yes and VLC would probably work too. One or two weekly to VLC by wizz, two or three to BCN by vueling and if iberia uses their CR9 maybe even four weekly to MAD.
DeleteRoutes that would work in terms of passengers demand which could be subsided: Austrian to VIE, SAS to CPH or/and ARN, Eurowings/ Condor to HAM/ DUS, Easyjet to BER, Jet2 to MAN, Wizz to SKP maybe even TIA and I think Iberia to MAD or Vueling to BCN would preform very good now, when there is no more seriuos issues with covid. But again I highly doubt any of this to happen next year with exception of SKP flights maybe
ReplyDeleteAir Serbia to BEG for frequency increasing.
DeleteThat might be a reason why JU is waiting to announce 18 weekly flights to BEG.
Either we will see Wizzair base or Amelia, and for the sake of longevity i hope it's gonna be the latter
ReplyDeleteI really hope you are right but I really doubt that any airline will make a base at LJU next year. But Amelia would be fantastic, they are very stable airline aswell.
DeleteForget Amelia, it is only registred here, they will probably never operate as a classical airline and especially not in Slovenia
DeleteBut why? They had ideas and thoughts about it since Adria collapsed so I think there is possibilty. And in the end they are Slovenian airline and with aircraft types such as erj145, Atr72 and A319 they could do really well.
DeleteAmelia would be great. Yes, they are at least very carefully observing situation in Slovenia. Maybe, with planned new financial aid scheme they decide to fly from LJU. They now operate a few niche regular lights (e.g. AMS-SXB) as their own. So, maybe... And the interiors of their aircraft - especially A319 - look classy.
DeleteAgree, Amelia is the closest to the passinger airline with good management, with structure in place. If the world be good cooperation between the between Amelia and Slovenia state, this would be shortest path to establish national airline with shared ownership. Think you would find interest on both sides.
Deleteplease enlighten what 'right structure, has ,white tail operator (Amelia) to operate scheduled ops beside the fact their equipment is false for LJU?
DeleteI'm not surprised with which airlines received the most money. They offer the most flights from LJU.
ReplyDeleteHope it helps with LJU's recovery.
ReplyDeleteI hope this finally means we could see more flights from easyjet and Wizz and maybe even Ryanair comes.
ReplyDeleteHopefully they stimulate some new arrivals.
ReplyDeleteSAS, Eurowings, Austrian, Tui/ Jet2
DeleteGood decision
ReplyDeleteJust another way to give money to Lufthansa.
ReplyDeleteYeah I'm sure Lufthansa lives off Slovenian subsidies.
DeleteShouldn't the airport operator provide incentives for airlines???
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure they do have some incentive program. But their network planning and growth department seems to be in a deep sleep.
DeleteOfcourse they are in deep sleep. No airlines no competition for Cartel!
DeleteGood luck
ReplyDeleteHope it works out
ReplyDeleteWill Maribor Airport be included?
ReplyDeleteNo one flies to Maribor.
DeleteAmelia with erj145 stationed at MBX could work with few weekly flights to Munich, Frankfurt, Rome or something like that.
DeleteYes, like Styrian Spirit operated as Slovenian Spirit did with CRJ200.
DeleteExactly
DeleteIf there's a market, it doesn't need subsidies.
ReplyDeleteSubsidies are for lost cases.
+1
DeleteEC madness: give money to domestic airline - prohibited! give money to foreign airline - legal!
ReplyDeletehow is this legal??
ReplyDeleteKind of okay for new routes. But for existing routes it would be better to give rabat as a motivation to fly to LJU.
ReplyDelete