Why do some promising routes in Africa still have no flights?
The Southern Africa Tourism Alliance (SATA), led the discussions on why, Johannesburg to Mumbai and Brussels to Cape Town, two of Sub-Saharan Africa’s strongest unserved routes, still have no direct flight, at AviaDev Africa 2026 in Gabarones. The Alliance said according to the Airbus Exploring the Horizon study, they appear among the high demand corridors […]
Why do some promising routes in Africa still have no flights?
The Southern Africa Tourism Alliance (SATA), led the discussions on why, Johannesburg to Mumbai and Brussels to Cape Town, two of Sub-Saharan Africa’s strongest unserved routes, still have no direct flight, at AviaDev Africa 2026 in Gabarones.
The Alliance said according to the Airbus Exploring the Horizon study, they appear among the high demand corridors where passengers continue to route through a third city because no carrier has yet launched a service. “Some of the continent’s connectivity gaps have narrowed over the past year. Qantas added Perth to Johannesburg, Edelweiss introduced their A350 service to Windhoek, Air Congo announced a Brussels link to Kinshasa and Ethiopian secured approval to serve Mauritius. If those routes can move from proposal to operations, why do others with similarly strong demand remain unserved?”
They added that during the discussion the panel agreed that none of the stakeholders can make a route work alone, airports need traffic, tourism boards need visitors and airlines need confidence that travellers have a reason to come.
