MANILA, Philippines—The Philippine air service negotiating panel is gearing for a new round of air talks with Macau and Canada before summer ends.

The Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB) said air talks with Macau were to start next week and with Canada in May.

In both cases, the air panel will ask for additional flights.

“We are optimistic especially in the case of Macau, because both sides want more flights,” CAB deputy director Porvenir Porciuncula said in a telephone interview.

The results of the talks will have a bearing on expansion plans of Cebu Pacific Air and Philippine Airlines (PAL).

Cebu Pacific has long ago asked the CAB for help in pushing for additional entitlements that would make its plans for a hub in the Clark Freeport, north of Manila, viable.

“Only Singapore has granted us flights from Clark,” Cebu Pacific president and chief executive Lance Gokongwei said at a press briefing earlier in the week.

Cebu Pacific, a budget airline, needs five destinations to make its Clark hub viable. It has asked the air service negotiating panel for help in pursuing entitlements that would make four other routes possible: Macau-Clark, Bangkok-Clark, Hong Kong-Clark, and Taipei-Clark.

The negotiating panel had a hard time trying to set up a meeting with Canadian representatives on PAL’s desire to mount more flights to Vancouver.

PAL wants to add direct flights to Vancouver and to US destinations with a stopover in Vancouver.

The resumption of air talks with Canada has made PAL hopeful, but a snag may still derail the carrier’s plans for North America. Complicating matters is a downgrade earlier this year of the Philippines’ air security agency, the Air Transportation Office, by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) from Category 1 to Category 2.

The FAA’s Category 2 prohibits PAL from increasing its flights to the United States and its territories and from changing the type or increasing the number of aircraft used on these routes.

PAL currently flies to Las Vegas via Vancouver. Before the FAA decision, PAL planned to open flights to San Diego, Chicago, New York, Seattle and Saipan. With editing by INQUIRER.net