18 April 2013
South African Airways (SAA) and India’s Jet Airways have signed a code share agreement to allow connectivity to several business hubs in both countries, effective from Thursday.
SA Airways is currently the only airline with non-stop flights between Johannesburg and Mumbai and under the agreement, SAA will code share on Jet Airways’ routes between Mumbai and Delhi, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai and Thiruvananthapuram.
Jet Airways will code share on SAA’s flights between Mumbai and Johannesburg, as well as Cape Town and Durban.
“This partnership strengthens the historic commercial, political and cultural cooperation between South Africa and India,” acting commercial general manager, Manoj Papa, said in a statement on Tuesday.
“In essence, the agreement further supports the objectives of the BRICS member states.”
Research by the Tourism Department that visitors from India to South Africa increased 122% between 2005 and 2010, 29% between January and September 2011 and a further 18% between the same period in 2012.
“Besides its global popularity as a tourist destination, South Africa – in its capacity as Africa’s largest economy – is also a strategic trade and investment destination,” said Jet Airways’ chief commercial officer, Sudheer Raghavan.
“With the seamless connections offered between India and South Africa, we are confident that this mutually beneficial code share will prove extremely popular with both business and leisure travellers.”
SAA customers on its Voyager loyalty programme will earn miles and tier status if they travel on Jet Airways unsing SAA-issued tickets, and Jet customers on the Privilege programme will also earn miles and tier status.
“We have been witnessing a steady increase in the number of business and leisure travellers coming into South Africa,” Papa said.
“Using Johannesburg as a convenient connection hub, a significant number of these travellers are also taking advantage of SAA’s vast route network of 26 destinations across Africa as well as access to over 1 300 airports in almost 200 countries through our Star Alliance membership.”
SAinfo reporter
