Another private airline attempting to link the Caribbean has failed, at least temporarily so it is said. The curtailing of REDjet flights, without a confirmed date for restarting service, is spectacular, given the hype that accompanied its coming on to the routes. The flashy marketing programme, using the "Red" of its name and the advertising of unbelievably low fares (that is, when the airport taxes and other elements of the ticket were excluded) made an impact, and passengers acquired expectations.
As important was the promise made by the REDjet owners and management that the airline would bring quality service to reduce to a minimum long waits, cancelled flights and the range of disservice of airlines such as Liat.
One achievement of REDjet that has to be noted is the influencing of fares downward and the quality of service upward. That must be considered a plus for the venture; however, sustainability is what matters.
Perhaps the owners of REDjet had somehow over-simplified the high cost of operating an airline in the region. Neither aircraft purchase nor lease is inexpensive; the purchase of fuel and the maintenance of aircraft are also extremely high; and keeping a full staff of employees, even when a private owner can keep the numbers down and demand great productivity from staff, has proven very difficult for all airlines.
These are hard realities which will not yield to flashy marketing campaigns. Perhaps, too, the owners of REDjet were a little too confident about achieving instant success. That kind of self-assurance often leads to the overlooking of cost realities which face all airlines in the treacherous world of aviation.
In its statement at the cessation of flights, the management of the airline was asking for access to the subsidies given to state-owned airlines, Caribbean Airlines Ltd and Liat. In instant response, the Minister of Transport made it clear that the Government had no intention of flying that route.
The question must be whether, in the interest of securing low fares for passengers wanting to travel within the Community and Single Market, governments should think of exerting competitive pressure on the state-owned airlines by offering the subsidies to privately-owned airlines.
However, for many years the governments of tourism-dependent countries in the Caribbean have paid for empty seats coming into the region on the so-called large legacy carriers. And while decisions to subsidise were based on the possibilities of direct returns from the tourism industry, such models have not worked, and many of those airlines have departed for larger and more lucrative markets in South America and Europe.
One other absolutely untenable situation has been the absurdity of billion-dollar subsidies paid to the likes of BWIA, Liat and now CAL, with little return in terms of growth and development of a sustainable airline.
It is therefore not a simply matter of a choice between privately- or state-owned airlines. What is also more than a little hilarious is the fact of several national airlines, operating half-empty inside and outside the Caribbean, losing billions every year.
The time has obviously arrived for governments and private local and foreign capital to seriously consider the best model to achieve the travel objectives of the region.
The one sure requirement is for all Caricom governments to come together to tame the notorious beasts of insularity and individual nation-pride. It cannot be that three or four Eastern Caribbean states should take the burden of Liat, and Trinidad and Tobago continues to fund CAL, while residents of all Caribbean states make use of the air service.
But Caribbean people have to find solutions to Caribbean problems.
