German airline Lufthansa will take advantage of strong economic performance in Latin America at a time when its businesses elsewhere are under pressure, a senior executive said on September 21. The airline industry as a whole has been hit by a fragile global economy and the soaring cost of jet fuel. Lufthansa said on September 20 that it no longer expected to improve on last year's operating profit.
But the carrier is expanding in Latin America, opening what it sees as key routes in recent months, including to Bogota and Rio de Janeiro. It has also launched an alliance with Colombian and Salvadoran tie-up AviancaTaca for other routes.
"We want to develop our business in Latin America because we see that the area has been quite stable during the crisis," Lufthansa's vice president for the Americas, Jurgen Siebenrock, told Reuters during a visit to Venezuela.
Lufthansa flirted with Spanish carrier Iberia a few years ago hoping to boost its access to the growing aviation market in Latin America, where it generates only about 2 percent of its traffic revenue. Iberia later merged with British Airways to form International Airlines Group (IAG).