Growing business ties and connections between China and Africa are prompting more African carriers to look eastward and consider opening new air routes to China, industry sources say.

John Mirenge, chief executive officer of RwandAir, the Rwandan government-controlled air travel operator, says that although the carrier will strive to attract more passengers to Africa, domestic passengers will continue to be the mainstay of its business.

At the same time, identifying travel patterns and habits of passengers are crucial for the long-term success of African carriers, Mirenge says, adding that the planned new routes to China are a logical extension of the demand from African passengers.

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"RwandAir operates a daily flight to Dubai now, which is the only route it operates outside the African continent. But African business and trade communities are looking further than Dubai, more to the Far East, especially China," he says. "China is certainly on our radar and we plan to be there in the next three years."

Apart from China, Europe would be another major destination for the Rwandan carrier. The company is expecting its wide-body fleet of aircraft to cater to the rising tourist demand from Europe and also match up to the standards and requirements of European airports.

As far as China is concerned, Mirenge says that the carrier anticipates a steady influx of Chinese tourists and expanding investment between both sides.

"The reason that we are so confident of future business prospects is that our research shows that most of the European passengers coming to Africa are not using European carriers, but rather African ones. We believe that Chinese passengers will also follow a similar trend in the future because we have direct connections and are better tailored in terms of sub-regional destinations," he says.

The company already has informal tie-ups with Chinese aviation companies such as China Southern Airlines Co Ltd in the Dubai sector, but is looking for more formal alliances with Chinese carriers to tap into the China-Africa aviation market, he says.

In 2010, the Rwandan government re-branded and restructured the small express airline known as Rwanda Express into what is now known as RwandAir. The carrier earlier operated only in the Rwandan sub-region and had been in existence for seven years at that time.

According to Mirenge, the company is still relatively small in terms of fleet size, but is witnessing rapid change.

The company has seven Boeing 737 aircraft, five of which are directly owned by it, while the other two are on lease. Mirenge says that the carrier plans to expand the fleet to 12 in the next five years and add more destinations.

"If we look at the other regional carriers in Africa such as Ethiopian or Kenya airways, they were pretty much at a similar size two decades ago," he says. "Our ambition is to develop the company and other infrastructure and related facilities in Rwanda with organic and qualitative growth.

"The Rwandan government feels that the aviation industry, especially commercial aviation, would be the cornerstone for economic development," he says. "As a country that is physically landlocked, Rwanda has to tap into its strategy to link it to the rest of the continent through aviation links."

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