EVA Air carries more passengers

JAKARTA (JP): The number of passengers transported between Taiwan and Indonesia by EVA Air of Taiwan during the first five months of this year increased by 58.13 percent to 68,000 over the same period of 1995.

EVA Air's representative in Jakarta, Peter Chen, told The Jakarta Post that during the first five months of this year, the airline carried 35,000 inbound passengers to Indonesia and 33,000 outbound passengers from Indonesia. The figures in 1995 were 22,000 for inbound passengers and 21,000 for outbound passengers.

The five-year-old airline, owned by the Evergreen Group, currently links two cities in Taiwan -- Taipei and Kaohsiung -- with three Indonesian cities: Jakarta, Denpasar and Surabaya.

Chen said the passengers carried by his company from Indonesia were mostly Indonesians.

"About 60 percent of the passengers from Indonesia on our boards are Indonesians. About 50 percent or 60 percent of them were proceeding on trips to the United States, while the remainder visited Taiwan."

He said that his company gained a 20 percent share of the flight service to the United States.

EVA Air flies to major destinations in Asia, New Zealand, Australia, Europe and Central America with a fleet of 27 jets. It also serves a number of destinations in the United States, including San Francisco, Seattle, Los Angeles, Anchorage, New York, Newark and Honolulu.

Indonesia has licensed two U.S. airlines -- Northwest Airlines and United Airlines -- to fly to Indonesia, but neither of them has started their Indonesian services. Meanwhile, the state-owned Garuda Indonesia is the only Indonesian airline flying to the United States. (icn)