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Kazakhstan’s national airline Air Astana has raised ticket prices on international flights, Tengrinews reports.
This comes as a response to Kazakhstan’s decision to float the tenge exchange rate, which triggered a 36 percent spike in the exchange rate and a landslide depreciation of the tenge, Kazakh national currency.
“Starting from August 22, the ticket fares on international flights made by the airline will be raised by 25 percent in connection with introduction of the free floating exchange rate,” Air Astana Corporate Communications Department told Tengrinews.
The airline had to increase the prices to content losses, because most operations in the global airline industry are conducted in dollars. “Over two thirds of the airline's expenses are in dollars, including the purchase and leasing of aircrafts, maintenance, spare parts, fuel, insurance and many other costs. Since most of the airline’s revenue is in tenge, the company is forced to increase the prices to meet its dollar liabilities," the company said.
However the 25% may not be the final step in the company's attempt to compensate for its losses. "Air Astana emphasizes that the increase in the prices will in no way fully make up for all the losses, therefore it will be considering other measures," it said.
By Assel Satubaldina, editing by Tatyana Kuzmina
