The 16-nation South Pacific Forum is working on a concept study aimed at establishing a single flight information region (FIR) - and hopes to present a final report to aviation ministers in June.
The decision to complete the study was taken at a meeting of member nations in Auckland, New Zealand, in mid-February. A draft study has been prepared by a working group from the forum together with representatives of the International Air Transport Association (IATA).
IATA's Asia-Pacific infrastructure director, Anthony Laven, says the working group did not want to finalise the concept document until it had presented the draft to the 16 nations. "We will go ahead and complete it, "says Laven.
A revised version of the draft document will be prepared and circulated to member nations and interested parties for further discussion before the report is finalised. The report will be presented to the ministers at their meeting in Nadi, Fiji, on 11 June.
The South Pacific region is divided into five FIRs, covered by Fiji, New Zealand, Nauru, the Solomon Islands and the USA. On 4 May last year, the aviation ministers of the forum member states agreed an action plan to optimise air safety, reduce aviation costs and boost tourism in the Pacific region.
Part of this plan was the adoption of a framework to unify Pacific airspace by using satellite-based technology.
"It would potentially create one of the largest and most cost-effective single air traffic management regions in the world," says the forum. "Airlines could save millions of dollars in operational costs each year," it says.
Complex legal and institutional issues remain to be resolved, however, because the plan could involve the delegation of air traffic services for sovereign and oceanic airspace to an outside service provider. Australia and New Zealand are potential providers for the region.
Further complications arise from the cessation of air traffic services provided by the USA from its Oakland, California, control centre, and by Fiji, which handles the Cook Islands, Samoa, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.
Members of the 16-strong South Pacific Forum are Australia, the Cook Islands, Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, New Zealand, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, the Marshall Islands, Samoa, the Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.
Source: Flight International
