Good morning. It is a great pleasure to be here at the World Knowledge Forum. And I am particularly happy to be making my first appearance at the Forum in this year for a couple of reasons. First, this year"™s theme-Invigorating the Global Economy-is particularly appropriate for a discussion of aviation and I will discuss that in detail a bit later. And secondly, this year is a very special one for the global commercial aviation industry. We are celebrating its first 100 years. (…)
That 23-minute journey across Tampa Bay, Florida on 1 January 1914 was a momentous event. It changed our world immeasurably for the better. It all began as a partnership of three visionaries:
Percival Fansler, an entrepreneur who saw commercial opportunity in the technology of flight Thomas Benoist, who built the aircraft, and Tony Jannus, who safely piloted the plane to its destination.
They could see the value in transporting people quickly over geographic obstacles. The journey across Tampa Bay would have taken a lot longer on land or water.
That value was seen by Abram Pheil. He became the real hero of the day when he purchased the first ticket. And he paid a handsome price: $400. In today"™s money, that is the equivalent of $9,500.
Despite the price, Pheil"™s journey would not have been very comfortable. He was seated next to the pilot and exposed to the elements. The aircraft flew no higher than about 15m above the water. So he probably experienced about as much spray as he did wind while traversing Tampa Bay.
Flying has changed a lot since then. It has become a lot safer, much more comfortable, and a lot more accessible. On this last point, I did a bit of searching on the internet yesterday and found return fares from Seoul to New York for about $1,200. So one could literally go the other side of the world and back about eight times for the price that Pheil paid to cross a rather small bay!
People caught the flying bug. The airline industry quickly grew from a single aircraft, one route and a lone passenger. This year we will connect 3.3 billion passengers and 52 million tonnes of cargo over 50,000 routes. Since commercial aviation began 65 billion passengers have traveled by air.
At a personal level, flying delivers great value. It brings people together-families, friends and business colleagues. It helps minds to meet and exchange ideas in forums like this. It gives people the freedom to be almost anywhere in just 24 hours. And it has turned our wonderfully big planet into a wonderfully small world of enormous and wonderful opportunities.
I truly believe that aviation is a force for good in our world. I have been in the industry for nearly four decades and have seen that demonstrated in front of my eyes. Last week we saw news that China is now the world"™s largest economy. And then were counter-claims that if you looked at Purchasing Power Parity, the US still ranked first. In the 1970"™s when I began working in the airline industry in Hong Kong we all knew of the potential for Chinese growth. But it was not even in the top 10. And it is very clear that air connectivity has played a key role in the rise of modern China….
