Airline seat capacity reducing from East Asia to New Zealand but trans-Tasman competition increasing

Thai Airways was reported in the Wall Street Journal to be considering routing its non-stop Bangkok-Auckland operations via Australia.

On 26 July 2008 the Star reported that Malaysia Airlines plans to use smaller aircraft on its services to Australia and New Zealand. It is temporarily reducing capacity to Auckland by one flight per week for a month.

On 7 August 2008 the China Post reported that EVA Airways would be suspending its operations to Auckland from 1 September 2008 and Tourism New Zealand would be closing its Taipei office.

By way of background, in 2006 Garuda ceased services from Denpasar to Auckland, and Air New Zealand ceased operations to Singapore when it extended its Hong Kong services to London and commenced services to Shanghai.

On a more positive note for seat capacity to New Zealand, on 18 July 2008 Air New Zealand commenced non-stop operations to Beijing, and Pacific Blue has announced that it will be commencing trans-Tasman services on both the Melbourne-Auckland (from 22 September 2008) and Sydney-Auckland (from 14 October 2008) routes. Emirates is reported in the NZ Herald on 8 August 2008 to be planning to introduce the A380 on services to Auckland from 1 February 2009 and increase the size of aircraft it operates to Christchurch. Royal Brunei has started operating daily to Auckland via Brisbane.

It would be hard to find many examples around the world where so many airlines are competing as on the main trans-Tasman routes.