KARACHI, Oct 25: The PIA’s Board of Directors meeting was held on Tuesday under the chairmanship of Tariq Kirmani to review the recent performance and future plans of the national flag carrier.

A PIA release said the meeting was apprised of the improvements in operational indicators translated into an increase of 10 per cent in overall revenue during July-September 2005 over same period last year.

It said aggregate revenue was recorded at Rs15,981 million in this quarter as against Rs14,556 million last year, denoting an improvement of Rs1,425 million.

The press release said operating expenses, excluding fuel, were contained to within 1.1 per cent. Fuel expenses, however, driven by record increases in global prices, continued to rule the roost, adversely impacting the gains in revenue, it added.

PIA’s bill in the last quarter increased by a phenomenal 52 per cent over the corresponding quarter last year totalling Rs7,140 million.

According to the press release, during the meeting, the board noted that progressive growth of key operational indicators of the airline with passenger traffic increasing by 12 per cent and passenger seat utilization improving from 71 per cent last year to a record 80 per cent in the quarter.

It said passenger seat utilization at 80 per cent was better than all the leading competitors in the region. As a result of several marketing initiatives taken in May 2005, the airline was able to recapture its lost market share in targeted markets.

The press release said PIA’s share of domestic passengers went up from 46 cent in April 2005 to 58 per cent in July-September 2005. Similarly its share of international passengers increased from 43 per cent in April 2005 to 47 per cent in July-September 2005.

The board was pleased to note that the growth in traffic was achieved despite reduction in capacity by 0.9 per cent during the same period. Matching deployment of capacity with demand resulted in PIA’s fleet utilization outperforming the industry average for all the aircraft types in PIA’s fleet.

The press release further said the board was apprised of the strategies being adopted in key areas of the airline to enhance revenues, curtail costs and improve standard of service.

This included proactive marketing decision-making to stay ahead of competition, re-engineering operating procedures to economize on fuel burn-off, restructuring and reorganizing human resources so as to improve employee productivity, disinvestment in non-core activities and instituting control mechanisms for containing the controllable costs.

The board was informed that the airline is confident that its multi-pronged strategies on targeted fronts would put it on the path of sustained profitability.

Besides, the board appreciated the various measures being taken by management to steer the airline through these difficult times faced by the entire aviation industry.

The meeting was attended by Director General Civil Aviation, Air Marshal (Retd) Pervez Akhtar Nawaz, Additional Secretary Ministry of Defence, Maj. Gen. (Retd) Muhammad Ashraf Chaudhry, Asad Ali Khan, M.H.K Khaisghi, Javed Saifullah Khan, Dr Sughra Jenejo, S.Ali Raza and Kamal Afsar.