Air traffic movements also increased by 2.7% over last April to 24,725. Passenger volume declined 1.5% to approximately 4.2 million.

The strong cargo growth was mainly attributed to the continued recoveries in HKIA’s key export markets, in particular North America and Europe. Exports recorded an increase of 57%, while imports and transshipments showed year-on-year growth of 30% and 10% respectively.

Meanwhile, Hong Kong resident travel registered a year-on-year decline of 4%, and transfer/ transit traffic dropped by 9%. However, visitor numbers showed an increase of 8%, which was driven by traffic to and from South East Asia and North Asia.

Speaking about the performance of the passenger market, Stanley Hui Hon-chung, Chief Executive Officer of Airport Authority Hong Kong, said, “The exceptionally strong Easter holiday traffic of last year had already created a high base for comparison. Then, Iceland’s volcanic eruption and the Black Outbound Travel Alert for Thailand (Bangkok) this year further impacted travel. As a result, there predictably was a slight decline in passenger throughput last month. However, growth momentum for passenger traffic remains strong, and I am confident we will continue to see an improvement in these numbers over the coming months.”

From January to April 2010, HKIA handled 16.2 million passengers, 1.3 million tonnes of cargo and 94,825 aircraft movements, representing year-on-year growth of 4.5%, 35.1% and 1.6%, respectively.

On a rolling 12-month basis, cargo throughput was up by 9.3% to 3.7 million tonnes year on year, while passenger volume decreased by 2.1 % to 46.9 million and air traffic movements recorded a decline of 4.9% to 280,905.

Traffic Statistics at HKIA, Apr-2010