The extension of the tourist season through the attraction of tourists and new markets, such as Asian, is the biggest target for the development of Thessaloniki airport, which has the features of a metropolitan airport.

This was highlighted during the International Tourism Conference Philoxenia “Asian Tourism: Greece as a destination and as European Portal” by the General Manager of Merchant and Business Development of Fraport Greece Mr. Giorgos Villos.

The Philoxenia International Conference, with organizational consultant the company Tourism Generis, takes place within the Philoxenia-Hotelia exhibition, from today until the next Sunday at the International Exhibition Center of Thessaloniki.

Towards this direction Fraport Greece, which has taken over management and development of Thessaloniki airport and 13 others regional airports, steps up its efforts to enrich the passenger traffic of the city with new routes and by attracting new airlines.

According to Mr. Velos, Qatar Airways will operate the direct flight Doha-Thessaloniki from the end of March 2018.

So far 45.000 Asians and Australians arrive at Thessaloniki transit from other airports.

It should be noted that 47% of these passengers have stopped up to two times and 4% up to three times before they reach Thessaloniki and so there is a need to attract new direct flights linking Asia with the city.

As for passenger traffic, in the first nine months of 2017 the airport of Thessaloniki recorded an increase of 13,3% (600.000 additional passengers).

Last year, the city’s airport had a total passenger traffic of 5,7 millions, with foreign passengers forming a major development driving force.

In the next four years, Fraport Greece, according to Mr. Velos, will have invested 400.000.000 Euros in the 14 regional airports in the country, which in the first nine months of 2017 increased passenger traffic by 11%. An estimate for this year is that overall at these airports the passengers will exceed 27 million.