Emirates launches flights between Cebu and Dubai

Emirates celebrates the inauguration of its Dubai-Cebu-Clark-Dubai circular service to the Philippines with a dinner graced by special guests Miss World 2013 Megan Young, award-winning Filipino artist Gary Valenciano and top Emirates officials.

CEBU CITY—Emirates recently launched direct flights from this city to Dubai, supporting projections of significant growth in Cebu’s tourism and trade in the coming years.

The new flights will put more focus on Cebu as a tourist destination and as a jump-off point to nearby islands and beyond, said Andrew Acquaah Harrison, chief executive adviser of GMR Megawide Cebu Airport Corp. (GMCAC).

“It means that people from the Visayas and Mindanao can easily access Cebu to take these flights directly to their destinations, and airlines like Emirates give us global connectivity to so many parts of the world,” Harrison said.

The Cebu-Dubai flight is the latest of new flights taking off from the Mactan-Cebu International Airport (MCIA).

Earlier opened were the flights to Los Angeles (March 15), Taipei (March 27) and Xiamen (March 28).

For the first time, Emirate Airlines will embark on a daily two-stop, circular service in the Philippines, briefly stopping over at Clark from Cebu before continuing to Dubai, a gateway to the Middle East and capital of the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Talks of a partnership among Emirates, GMCAC and the national government began last year, with issues smoothened out by the airline’s existing ties with GMCAC in its airports in India, Harrison said.

“We’ve done our study. Cebu is one of the markets we would like to go into,” said Salem Obaidalla, Emirates senior vice president for aeropolitical and industry affairs.

His company opened direct flights from Manila to Dubai in 1990 and is now considering regional airports as part of its growth plans.

“There is growth potential here in Cebu,” Obaidalla said, citing that on the inaugural flight alone, load capacity was 95 percent.

A number of its tourist passengers were from Europe, he added.

Obaidalla expressed optimism that his company could sustain the travel market between Cebu and Dubai—a mix of tourists, overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), and business people.

“Our extensive global network of over 150 destinations will help enhance connectivity for both Cebu and Clark, providing more choices for travelers, more markets for regional products, and more opportunities for inbound tourism,” said Badr Abbas, Emirates senior vice president for commercial operations in the Far East.

Export shipments to the United Arab Emirates from the Visayas and Mindanao will also be made easier with the direct flight, he said.

Cebu’s tourism and trade prospects extend not only to Dubai but to 39 other destinations in Europe, 16 in the Middle East, and a number in Africa and South America, Abbas said.

Harrison said more new flights were expected in the coming months.

“This is what we wanted—to be able to diversify markets,” he said, stressing that at present, 63 percent of all foreign tourists flying in are from Korea.

“We cannot depend on just one market. We had said we wanted the United States, European Union, Middle East and China. We’ve achieved three this March. We’re ready for an EU carrier, but we want to wait a little bit because of capacity issues,” Harrison said.

GMCAC is also targeting Australia, more cities in China, and Thailand. It is already negotiating with a Thai airline.

The MCIA services direct flights to 12 international destinations—Busan, Dubai, Hong Kong, Incheon, Osaka, Kuala Lumpur, Los Angeles, Nagoya, Narita, Singapore, Taipei and Xiamen.