China News Service, Xiamen, July 25 (Reporter Yang Fushan) China Eastern Airlines, which entered Xiamen 30 years ago and set up a sales department, unveiled its Xiamen branch in Xiamen on the 25th, opening China Eastern Airlines’ full participation in the west coast of the Taiwan Strait. A new journey of economic zone construction.
This is a major strategic decision made by China Eastern Airlines, Xiamen City and related parties to better serve the "Belt and Road" and the construction of special economic zones and free trade zones, and to promote the integrated development of both sides of the Taiwan Strait.
The establishment ceremony of China Eastern Airlines Xiamen Branch. Photo by Yang Fushan
"It will be in Xiamen, the junction of the land and sea Silk Roads, and strive to build an air silk road that connects the whole world, and to the world for Xiamen and Xiamen for the world," said a person from China Eastern Airlines.
China Eastern Airlines is the seventh largest airline in the world, with a modern fleet of more than 750 aircraft, with an annual passenger traffic of more than 130 million passengers and a route network to 1,150 destinations in 175 countries and regions around the world.
As the central city in the “One Belt, Five Axis, and Nine Districts” of the Haixi Economic Zone, Xiamen is the “strategic fulcrum of maritime cooperation” in the core area of the Maritime Silk Road and an important gateway for exchanges and cooperation with Taiwan.
As early as 1990, China Eastern Airlines set up a sales department in Xiamen, and established a Fuzhou base in 1997. In recent years, it has continued to increase its investment in strategic resources in Fujian. In 2019, China Eastern Airlines has 18 navigation points at Xiamen Airport, transporting nearly 3 million passengers.
Relevant persons of China Eastern Airlines were interviewed by the media. Photo by Yang Fushan
As the first regular charter flight for direct cross-strait flights, the first mainland airline to set up an office in Taiwan, and the airline that flies the most cross-strait flights, China Eastern has been dedicated to serving cross-strait exchanges and cooperation for more than ten years and building new bridges.
On June 10 this year, China Eastern Airlines and Xiamen Xiangye Group signed a strategic cooperation agreement to work together to strengthen the building door aviation industry, and strive to build Xiamen into an important international aviation hub in the southeastern part of the mainland.
A person from China Eastern said that with the establishment of the Xiamen branch, Xiamen will become a "new node" for SkyTeam's cooperative products and the global network after China Eastern's Shanghai Pudong hub and Beijing Daxing hub. Eastern Airlines also listed Xiamen as an important pillar of its "four beams and eight pillars" route strategy. It plans to invest 40 aircraft by 2025 and become one of the main base airlines in Xiamen market.
In the future, China Eastern Airlines plans to focus on increasing the density of flights from Xiamen to Shanghai, Beijing, Kunming, and Xi’an, and build the Xiamen-Shanghai, Xiamen-Beijing, Xiamen-Kunming, and Xiamen-Shaanxi express routes, and expand high-quality routes to Japan, South Korea, Southeast Asia, and Taiwan. Develop air routes to key cities in Europe and the United States at the right time.
China Eastern Airlines stated that it will also learn from the useful experience of operating in Beijing and Shanghai in the “two cities and four markets”, especially the experience of participating in the construction and operation of Beijing Daxing International Airport, participating in the construction of Xiamen’s new airport, giving full play to the advantages of civil aviation central enterprises, and promoting aviation logistics, aviation maintenance, The coordinated development of aviation catering, aviation technology, aviation finance, industrial investment, etc., will gather more factors such as the flow of people, logistics, capital, and talents for Xiamen, and effectively serve the economic and social development and reform and opening up of Fujian Province and Xiamen City. (Finish)