Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - Vietnam will temporarily halt the consideration of newairlines until the aviation market has recovered from the COVID-19 pandemic,according to Minister of Transport Nguyen Van The.

Theministry said the virus caused the global aviation market to collapse and Vietnam’swas no exception, which saw considerable drops due to restrictions intravel with all international and most domestic flights suspended in March andApril to prevent the spread of the virus.

Prioritywould be given to recovering the aviation market, resuming flights and removingthe difficulties of exiting carriers while the foundation of new carriers wouldonly be considered after the market recovered, The said.

Threeairlines were waiting to take off.

VietravelAirlines of tourism company Vietravel with a total investment of 700 billionVND (30.4 million USD) got the Prime Minister’s approval for the investmentguidelines in early April and expected to be able to take off in early 2021.

Thealso asked the Civil Aviation Administration of Vietnam (CAAV) to provideinstructions to Vietravel Airlines to complete the application for an airtransport licence. The evaluation of the carrier’s application must focus onthe feasibility and efficiency of the investment project and the company’sdevelopment strategy with regard to the impacts of COVID-19.

KiteAir of hospitality group Thien Minh and Vietstar Airlines of Vietstar AirlinesMultirole Corporation were racing for permits.

Previously,Vietnamese conglomerate Vingroup abandoned plans to launch Vinpearl Air, justmonths after announcing the new carrier.

Withthe ministry’s decision, these airlines must continue to wait for permits.

Therewere five local commercial airlines in operation, including Vietnam Airlines,Jetstar Pacific, Vietjet Air, Vietnam Air Services Company (VASCO) and BambooAirways.

Areport by the ministry at the end of April showed that the aviation industrywas hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic. It was estimated that Vietnam’s aviationmarket would serve around 43 million passengers this year, a drop of 46 percentagainst 2019.

CAAVDirector Dinh Viet Thang said the aviation market was seeing rapid recovery associal distancing was loosened.

InVietnam, domestic flights resumed in late April, while international flightswere expected to partially resume from the beginning of next month.

Thangpredicted that the domestic market could not recover to 2019’s average level untilmid-2021. He also forecasted the international market would not recover untilthe end of next year at the earliest.

Inmid-April, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc asked the Ministry of Transport togive careful consideration to the foundation of new airlines to ensure theefficiency of State’s management and sustainable development of the airlineindustry./.