On Tuesday, Dubai’s main airport announced it has retained its top position as the busiest airport in the world for international travel with nearly 29 million passengers shuttling through the global gateway last year. The passenger figures of the year 2021 are encouraging for the tourism-driven economy of Dubai, which is regarded as a key link between East and West. The number of travelling passengers is a sign that international travel has picked up somewhat since covid spawned unprecedented global lockdowns and border closures in the year 2020, according to a PTI report. The passenger figure of last year represents an increase of 12 percent in traffic at Dubai International Airport compared to the year 2020, which had registered approximately 26 million travelers.
Even with 29.1 million passengers crisscrossing through Dubai International Airport last year, the passenger figure is not even close to the pre-pandemic milestone of 86.4 million in annual traffic recorded by the airport in the year 2019. At present, the six-month-long World’s Fair is being hosted by Dubai, which was delayed by a year due to the coronavirus pandemic. According to the report, Expo 2020, which opened in the month of October and runs until March-end, has attracted millions of visitors as well as heads of state, celebrities and royalty, helping to further cement the reputation of Dubai as a global destination. Though, it is still unclear, what the Expo’s overall contribution has been to the economic recovery of Dubai.
According to Dubai Airports CEO, Paul Griffiths, DXB forecasts 57 million passengers to come this year through the airport, as well as a full recovery to pre-covid figures by the year 2024. For the eighth consecutive year, Dubai International Airport has been named the world’s busiest for international travel. The airport surpassed London’s Heathrow Airport and Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson Airport for international travelers, although the latter, in terms of overall passenger traffic, is among the busiest.
Dubai’s largest traffic share came from India with 4.2 million travelers, followed by Pakistan (1.8 million travelers) last year. The United Arab Emirates is home to over 100,000 British citizens. The main airport of Dubai logged 1.2 million passengers from the United Kingdom last year, including 77,000 passengers in the month of December alone.
Dubai, under orders from the aviation authority of UAE, was forced to ground all passenger flight services as well as close its airports for a period of eight weeks in spring 2020. Unlike the capital of UAE- Abu Dhabi, Dubai reopened its doors to international travelers quickly. Dubai didn’t require COVID-19 vaccination proof to enter and it also does not require a negative coronavirus test to enter most of the places. Due to this, the UAE was red-listed as a “do not travel” country by the US, UK as well as other nations last year.