GEAB Special File on Tourism

Air transportation: Turbulence zone

We have already warned against the risk of crisis in this sector (aircraft manufacturers, airline companies and infrastructure). In fact, the crisis is already well under way, as shown by the difficulties Boeing has encountered, the challenges to the Airbus-Boeing duopoly following the emergence of Asian competition, the crisis of low-cost airlines etc. The sector needs to reinvent itself, but that’s precisely the problem: it’s having trouble doing so. Research investments in a new generation of more energy-efficient equipment may have come too late, namely when the sector was already in crisis, and hence have been insufficient. These issues alone would justify a special issue of the GEAB. However, as part of these recommendations, we urge our reader-investors to be very cautious, both in terms of the conventional industry and innovative enterprises. On this second point, futuristic research into new air transport (electric aircraft, flying taxis, drones…) should be treated with the greatest of caution. As we have said before, we anticipate a marked downturn in the flow of mobility – and not just in terms of migration-related mobility – accompanied by a reinvention of trains as part of a dynamic of continental refocusing.