Qatar Airways this week published their Annual Report for 2019-2020, highlighting the group’s resilience in the face of the continued illegal airspace blockade against the State of Qatar and the most challenging period in global aviation’s history.

Qatar Airways is familiar with facing exceptional challenges; however, 2019-2020 has been one of the most difficult years in the airline’s history.

The combination of the ongoing illegal air space blockade against the State of Qatar, the liquidation of Air Italy by the majority shareholder, changes to accounting policy and reporting standards, and the COVID-19 pandemic crisis, has resulted in the Qatar Airways Group reporting a net loss of QAR7 billion. Excluding these exceptional items, the group’s results at both operating and net levels would have been better than that reported in the year before, clearly demonstrating the group’s improving performance.

Such improvement is evidenced from the increase in the group’s overall revenue and other operating income to QAR51.1 billion, up 6.4% compared to last year. Passenger revenue grew by 8.9% with capacity (Available Seat Kilometers) growth of 3.2%. Qatar Airways carried 32.4 million passengers, an increase of 9.8% over the last financial year.

Qatar Airways Group Chief Executive, HE Akbar Al Baker, said that despite the momentous challenges they faced in 2019-2020, Qatar Airways Group remain resilient, reporting strong underlying fundamentals. If not for the exceptional circumstances of fiscal year 2020, he said that their results would have been better than the year before.

During the fiscal year 2020, the group’s revenue increased to QAR51.1 billion, seat capacity increased by 3.2%, freight tonnes handled increased by 2.8% and passenger traffic at Hamad International Airport increased by 8.6%.

He said that Qatar Airways invested QAR16.8 billion in fleet and other assets during the year and had a cash balance of QAR7.3 billion at year end. Significant progress has been achieved in the three-year transformation plan, which began pre-COVID-19 and will position the group’s operations and practices to meet the current challenges.

HE Al Baker said he is extremely proud of the teams, departments and subsidiaries across the Qatar Airways Group that have remained agile and adapted quickly to the new reality.

These efforts are why we have become the largest international airline and air freight carrier since the onset of the pandemic, taking over two million people home safely and reliably and carrying over 250,000 tonnes of medical and aid supplies to impacted regions.

HE Al Baker also emphasised his confidence that they will emerge stronger from this difficult period and continue to innovate and set the standards that competitors can only hope to emulate. He said that they will continue to be the airline millions of passengers can trust and rely on in good times and bad, and proudly fly the flag of the State of Qatar across the globe.

Click on the links below to view the Qatar Airways Group Financial Reports:

For more information about Qatar Airways, visit qatarairways.com