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Ombudsman to regulate airport tariff structure

Special Correspondent

Empower AERA: committee
Develop common fuel supply network at airports: Ministry

NEW DELHI: An ombudsman will be appointed for regulating tariff structure at all airports and competition among fuel suppliers.

The decision was taken on Friday by the Cabinet, which accepted several recommendations of a parliamentary standing committee on the Airports Economic Regulatory Authority of India Bill, 2007. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh presided over the meeting.Amendments to the Bill, pending in the Lok Sabha since last September, will be moved in the coming session, Science and Technology Minister Kapil Sibal told journalists. Once the Bill is approved, it will be notified in three months, according to a Civil Aviation Ministry spokesperson. The committee recommended that the AERA be empowered to decide on both aeronautical and non-aeronautical service tariffs and that the fuel supply infrastructure at airports be brought under its purview.

The panel wanted the authority’s functions to cover all airports across the country, irrespective of their size or ownership. The government fully accepted four recommendations and partially accepted two, including the one on fuel infrastructure at the airports. It decided to partially accept the recommendation on inclusion of non-aeronautical revenue within AERA ambit. Charges for core services such as landing, parking, communication, navigation and air traffic control are the monopoly of the airport operator. Non-core services like office space, car parking and food denote non-aeronautical services.

The Ministry felt while non-aeronautical services should not be regulated per se, the revenue generated from them “may be taken as a factor relevant for determination of charges,” the spokesperson said.

This would help to moderate aeronautical charges through “maximisation of non-aeronautical revenues.”

At most of the airports, more than one oil firm supplied aviation turbine fuel (ATF) and they paid a throughput charge to the airport operator at mutually negotiated rates. Visualising greater competition among the ATF suppliers and optimal utilisation of the fuel supply infrastructure, the Ministry felt that a common supply network should be developed at the airports. Like the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, the AERA would seek to set quality standards and ensure a level-playing field for all airport operators, including those in the private sector.

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