Traffic falls for fifth consecutive month
International air passenger traffic dropped by 5.6% in January compared with the same period in 2008.
The International Air Transport Association (IATA), which released the figures, said it was also a full point below the traffic figures for last December.
The Association said demand had now fallen for five months in a row. It said the figures showed a "deepening, year-on-year demand slump."
The January dip was larger than the 2% cut in capacity by airlines. The decrease saw load factors drop by 2.8% to 72.8%.
IATA said there was also an "alarming" drop in cargo traffic, down 23.5% in January compared with the same month in 2008. Id December cargo traffic fell 22.6%.
Giovanni Bisignani, IATA's director general and ceo, said the figures showed the "industry is in a global crisis and we have not yet seen the bottom."
Asian carriers suffered the greatest drop on demand from passengers, recording an 8.4% fall. This however was slightly better than the 9.7% fall in December.
But the Association said that with the Japanese economy shrinking by an unprecedented 5%, prospects for the region were "dismal."
The fall in North America and Europe was, respectively, 6.2% and 5.7%.
Capacity in each region also dropped by, respectively, 2.6% and 3.6%.
The European decline was much higher than the 2.7% figure for December.
There were also falls in demand in Latin America (1.4%) and Africa (2.6%) while the Middle East was the only region to record in increase in traffic (3.1%).
Mr Bisignani said: "Alarm bells are ringing everywhere. Every region's carriers are reporting big drops in cargo. And, aside from the Middle East carriers, passenger demand is falling in all regions. The industry is in a global crisis and we have not yet seen the bottom.
"The only good news is that fuel prices remain well below last year's level. But the drop in demand is much more harmful. The industry is shrinking with revenues expected to fall by $35bn to $500bn, delivering a loss of $2.5bn this year."
He called on government not to tax airlines "to death" during the crisis to pay the banking industry.
Mr Bisignani cited the UK government's plans to increase the Air Passenger Duty and the Dutch government's departure tax as misguided levies.
www.iata.org