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Join on Telegram Rabat – Spanish airline Binter inaugurated on Saturday its new air route, linking Gran Canaria in the Canary Islands and the city of Fez in Morocco.
The flight will link the two destinations on Saturdays in a traveling period estimated at 2 hours and 20 minutes.
The inaugural flight landed in Fez yesterday at around 3 p.m. local time with 69 passengers on board, the majority of whom were Moroccans residing in Spain.
Mostapha El Khoudri, Director of Fez-Sais airport, emphasized the importance of the new air route as Morocco’s hospitality industry recovers from the impact of the COVID crisis. Since the resumption of activity within airport platforms at the end of last June, El Khoudri explained, the city of Fez’s travel recovery rate has reached 90% compared to the same period in 2019.
Data indicate that the Fez-Saiss airport has received 490,000 passengers in the past month, while “new airlines have announced the strengthening of their connections to and from this airport platform,” said El Khoudri.
Partnership between the Moroccan National Tourist Office (ONMT) and Binter has allowed the Spanish company to increase its Morocco travel figures for the summer of 2022 with over 34,000 seats.
During this summer season, Binter will connect the Canary Islands to ten destinations on the African continent, including the Moroccan cities of: Fez, Marrakech, Agadir, Guelmim, Laayoune, and Dakhla.
In addition to foreign tourists, Morocco has been welcoming millions of Moroccans residing abroad (MREs) as part of the 2022 Marhaba Operation, which is an annual initiative aimed at facilitating the transit of members of the Moroccan diaspora visiting the North African country to spend the summer holiday. The operation runs from June to September.
The return of Moroccan expatriates to their homeland during the summer season contributes to boosting the country’s economy. Morocco’s central bank, Bank Al-Maghrib said earlier this month that remittances from Moroccans abroad are set to reach $8.71 billion in 2022.
In 2023, money transfers from the diaspora will total $8.35 billion.
Bank Al Maghrib emphasized the importance of the Marhaba Operation, stating that travel receipts could benefit from the initiative and would experience a gradual recovery — rising from $3.41 billion in 2021 to $5.4 billion in 2022.
