■ MOZAMBIQUE: LAM posts strong rise in revenue, pax numbers for H1.

Mozambique's national carrier, LAM - Linhas Aéreas de Moçambique (TM), has announced an 8% rise in its revenues for the first half of its 2013 Financial Year buoyed by the highest July passenger traffic the airline has seen since its inception in 1980, airline managing director, Marlene Manave, has announced.

LAM Mozambique's 737 in Maputo
(H Krapf)

Speaking in Maputo during a recent presentation of the airline's 5-Year Plan (2014-2018), Ms Manave said revenue for H1 had now reached MZN2.2billion (USD74million) thanks to strong passenger traffic figures which totalled 300'000. However, despite the increase, she labelled the recorded figures as "satisfactory" adding that they had fallen below previously set targets for the year.

"These achievements are encouraging given the consolidation of our operations and the doubling of our fleet over the past four years to 12 [aircraft]; a move that has favoured the opening of new routes and increased frequencies to destinations with greater demand," said Manave.

Among the airline's future plans, she referenced the possibility, and difficulties, of exploiting the country's Indian Ocean presence through the establishment of flights to Mocimboa da Praia, a port in northern Mozambique lying on the Indian Ocean coast, near Tanzania, and to the French Indian Ocean territory of Mayotte. (Reference Air Austral's plans to establish a new regional carrier, EWA, which intends to include flights to Mozambique under a codeshare with LAM).

Summing up, Ms Manave said that in order to ensure sustainable growth, LAM's workforce should aim for six objectives namely: a progressive increase in profitability, the development of both the company and a system of quality management and robust security, human resource development, and the renewal of company's organizational model.

"Securing growth in the market requires us, as a company, and individually, to make an  enormous effort to make the ongoing restructuring of LAM a success with our overall aim being to show the market that more than working to the satisfaction of our customers, we are working to exceed all expectations," Manave concluded.