MENA Business Aviation Professionals Meet in Marrakech

Moroccan city of Marrakech will host the second Middle East & North Africa Business Aviation Association Show Sept.12-13. The event will bring together industry world leaders as Bell Helicopter, Swissport Aviation, Seaprime, G Ops, Gulfstream, Jetex, XJet…

“We are pleased to welcome the MEBAA Show Morocco, the only business aviation show in North Africa,” said Zouhair Mohamed El Aoufir, Chief of Moroccan Airports Authority.

“With the growth and opportunities for business aviation in Morocco, we expect to see an increase in interest from across the region and beyond, and are pleased to be able to offer this opportunity to aerospace companies”, he added.

For his part, Ali Alnaqbi, Founding & Executive Chairman of MEBAA said: “We are looking forward to the second edition of the MEBAA Show Morocco, in its new location at Marrakech Menara Airport”.

As the first business aviation show in North Africa, “the MEBAA Show Morocco is ideally placed to offer exhibitors an opportunity to be part of the region’s industry growth”, he stressed.

According to CEO & President of Jetex Flight Support Adel Mardini, “Morocco is the key destination for a large number of our customers, especially European clients, and it is a high traffic market for both business and leisure private aviation travel”.

He went on to say that “Marrakech is a key destination in North Africa. It is stable and ideally situated for both European and Middle East customers”.

The Middle East and North Africa business aviation market is expected to grow, despite the impact of lower oil prices on commercial airlines.

Africa is expected to receive 200 aircraft deliveries valued at $7 billion over the next ten years, with over 80 pc of these predicted to be in the light or medium categories, according to the Bombardier outlook 2016 – 2025.

For the MENA region, aviation professionals expect annual fleet growth of 3.2 pc. As to the global business Jet market, it continues to be weak amid an unusual, sustained cyclical trend, which has affected demand levels for new business jets.

The significant competitive pressures from used jet inventory, fastidious buying behavior from businesses and downturn in the global energy sector have been impacting demand for new jets as reflected in the order intake over the recent years.

The market, however, has shown signs of a slow movement towards stabilizing & recovery in 2017 with a spurt in activity level for the first half of the year despite continued pressure from the used jets market.