EMIRATES this week launched a direct daily Clark-Dubai service, the airline’s second route to the Philippines.
Emirates country manager, Philippines, Gigie Baroa, said the flights would serve corporate and leisure travellers, as well as the two million-strong market of Filipinos working in the Middle East.
According to Mohammed Mattar, senior divisional vice president for Emirates, the carrier had been eyeing the route since 2005 and confident it would do well despite competition on flights to the South-east Asian country.
“Competition is good in the market. This gives us a chance to look at our quality, our product,” Mattar remarked.
Cebu Pacific will commence a daily Manila-Dubai service on October 7, while Philippine Airlines’ (PAL) low-cost subsidiary, PAL Express, will start five-times-weekly Manila-Dubai flights on November 6.
Emirates’ other Philippine route is between Manila and Dubai, which has been in operation since 1990 and grown from twice-weekly to three times daily, Baroa added.
Eleanor White, president of Swire Travel Philippines, said: “Clark, as a corporate hub, is getting stronger. Making flights (to Dubai) available from there is positive.”
Although corporate travel out Clark and the surrounding economic zone is “price-conscious”, clients sometimes get business class travel for company officers, she noted.
Clark International Airport welcomed “the new partnership” with Emirates, which would benefit from the airport’s ongoing 360-million-peso (US$8.7 million) terminal expansion project, said the airport’s president and CEO Victor Luciano.
