ALTA’s Executive Director Jose Ricardo Botelho at CAPA's Latin America Aviation & LCCs Summit
ALTA’s Executive Director Jose Ricardo Botelho discusses the association’s work to foster the development of SAF, the recovery of Latin America’s aviation sector and the economic benefits the industry creates in the region.
Transcript
Jose Ricardo Botelho:The main challenge that we have right now is the policy. We need the policy with transparency in Latin America and Caribbean region, and in ALTA we have been working with the governments in a positive way in order to bring benchmarks, what is the best for the region, because this region has a tremendous potential for development of SAF, especially in Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Chile. So what we're trying to do is everything starts— it's like the bridge starts with the policy, and these industries try to bring the concept to help the government and bring good rules in order to bring investments. This is quite new for everything, for everyone, that's right? When you talk about SAF, it's something that in 2016 we started with the Corsia, the offset of Corsia, decarbonization in ICAO. And after that, we see new technologies, You see the programmes talking about SAF. So it's quite new. It's quite new for this industry. It's quite new for the government. So what we're trying to say is that where you find the aviation, where the aviation is, you see development. So why not bring this concept of development for— and sit at a table and discuss about? We have done this. Yes, we have done this before. During the pandemic time, the governments and the industry, we worked together in order to have what? The cards, the document that was like a standard for each country. So we actually, I truly believe that I see the goodwill of the government, of governments and authorities to discuss about how it's going to be. This is part of this discussion. You know, Latin America has one of the best recoveries in the entire region. And why? For many reasons of that. And what is interesting is that Latin America, the recovery was the best, one of the best in the world. However, when you think about USA, they have some support of the government. Europe, support of the government. Asia, some in some cases support of the government. But in this region, the airlines, they didn't have the support of the government talking about financial support, because what was the only process that we saw here was changing some rules in order to give the opportunity to airlines to survive. But considering this point of no return, let's not Walk— look backwards because we are going to the future. Let's walk and look forward. What we see is that we have a lot of people coming back to this contact with nature. We have 0 point— in average, 0.5% of the population around Latin America and the Caribbean travelling or flying, and you are talking about 600 million people. So this tremendous market is ready to come back. So the demand is coming back, the people is coming back because we want this contact with nature, and if you're trying to find the natural resources, tourism, this is in Latin America and the Caribbean region. So I truly believe that it's a question of time that this— we are going to see a lot in Latin America and the Caribbean. I'll give you an example. Mexico did great. Brazil did great, but did great in domestic flights, not because Brazil was closed to the other countries, but other countries, they were closed. I mean, the main market in Brazil, Argentina, was closed for a while. The second market, USA closed it for a while. Europe, third market, closed it for a while. So the population was flying here. This industry, the recovery of this industry, the way that we see is very good. So Colombia, Colombia did great job with lower taxes like the VAT. Colombia developed The development in Colombia was amazing. The connectivity in Colombia was amazing. In Brazil as well, Mexico as well, Dominican Republic as well. The tourism coming back. I mean, it seems for us that this region has a tremendous potential for development. It was temporary, and that was an agenda of the— in ALTA, that to talk with the government to to bring back, because they had 2, to bring back one and to keep the other one. And why this is so important? We try to bring the sense that if you have a huge taxation in this industry, you avoid people to coming back to this service. First of all, it's an essential service. It's not for, you know, for rich people. Aviation nowadays is, it means inclusion. So this is an opportunity to bring people in the system, to take people from the roads. I'll give you an example, taking Colombia, Medellín to Bogotá. If you go by car, 8 hours. If you go flying, 1 hour. Here in Brazil, you can spend 2, 3 days crossing the country, or you can do this in 3 hours. So Mexico, the same thing. So the concept is, let— if you want to do something, let this industry bring people in because this industry is calling people. Once they are here, the revenue is natural because they are going to consumers, they are going to the hotels. So it's good for the entire nation.
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