Airlines are in for a rocky ride when it comes to passenger growth, and cannot expect the same growth this year that they saw in 2007.
World airlines carried 7.4% more passengers on international flights last year than in 2006, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) has said.
But IATA said that there would be no encore performance this year, as airlines contend with rising oil prices and economic uncertainty.
The turbulence in the industry has already been reflected in December 2007 international passenger figures. These were 6.7% up on the December 2006 totals but that is a lower growth than in 2006. In December 2006, passenger numbers were up 9.3% compared with the same month in 2005.
IATA also said that international passenger planes were a record 77% full last year - the best year for passenger figures in recent memory - but that this upward trend was likely to slow in 2008.
European airlines carried 6% more passengers on international flights last year than in 2006, while the North American increase was 5.5%.
The biggest growth last year, of 18.1%, was among carriers in the Middle East.
