Airport Overview – Infrastructure Report 2021

Airports in the Asia-Pacific region are experiencing rapid growth in the number of passengers that they handle. As of November 2021, there were a total of 3,588 airports, airfields and landing strips in the Asia-Pacific region. Amongst these airports, the number of general aviation airports accounted for 69%, whilst the remainder are commercial airports.

In addition, airports can be categorized according to a variety of different runway lengths. GA airports with runways less than 800 meters (which are adequate for 98% of general aviation aircraft) account for 35% of all airports. However, most business jets require at least 1,600 meters for safe operations. The general aviation airports that satisfy that condition only account for 10% airports in the Asia-Pacific region.

In Asia-Pacific, Australia has the most general aviation airports, whilst mainland China has the most commercial airports. The population in Japan is less than one tenth in India, however, the number of both commercial airports and general aviation airports in both India and Japan are quite similar.

Moreover, the ratio between the number of commercial airports and general aviation airports is one to four in New Zealand and one to five in South Korea. On the other hand, the ratio between the number of commercial airports and general aviation airports is only 1 to 1.1 in mainland China.

Per capita airport density is used to estimate how many airports there are per 100,000 citizens in a region or country. Australia and New Zealand are the two countries with most airports per capita in the Asia-Pacific region. On the other hand, mainland China, Hong Kong, India, and Vietnam have the fewest airports per capita.

For a business jet to take-off and land, the runway length must be at least 1,600 meters according to international standards. Australia has the most airports capable of business jet operations, whilst mainland China has the largest business jet fleet size in the Asia-Pacific region.

When comparing the number of airports in a county to the size of its business jet fleet, Hong Kong, mainland China and Singapore have the least airports compared to the size of their business jet fleets. Australia, South Korea and Vietnam on the other hand have the most.