Business
LIAT facing collapse. Shareholders to meet to consider options
The three main shareholder governments in Leeward Islands Air Transport (LIAT) – the airline that is vital to movement of tourists and locals alike in the Caribbean – are scheduled to meet on January 31 to consider options for the airline which lost US$14.8 million last year.
If LIAT collapses, travel within the region will be severely affected. This will result in a loss of revenues to governments in myriad ways including the hefty landing fees LIAT pays. It will also affect hotels, taxis, retail outlets and restaurants. Business people and persons travelling for social purposes will also be affected.
Those who argue that the Trinidad and Tobago government owned Caribbean Airlines (CAL) and the low-fare airline, REDjet, will be able to take up the slack, underestimate just how much of a workhorse LIAT is, and the extent of the service that it provides including to uneconomic routes, even though it has now shed some of them. While George Nicholas, the Chairman of CAL, announced late last year that CAL “would gradually cover the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) countries with several flights a day”, that is yet to happen and indeed may never happen with the scheduled frequency of LIAT’s present flights.
