Civil Aviation and Tourism Minister Afroza Khanam on Wednesday said there is an opportunity to turn Biman Bangladesh Airlines into an international standard organisation through increasing operational activities and better management.
The Minister said this while responding to a starred question from ruling party lawmaker elected from Chattogram-13 Sarwar Jamal Nizam at Parliament.
She said Biman Bangladesh Airlines Limited in addition to operating flights, provides ground handling services to domestic and foreign airlines.
She said Biman has a shortage of aircraft and this problem needs to be resolved.
“To solve this problem, adding new aircraft to the Biman fleet will increase income and Biman will become a profitable organization.”
According to Biman's 'Network and Fleet Plan', she said that steps are underway to add new aircraft to the fleet and phase-out old aircraft from the fleet in stages.
“The process of acquiring aircraft on lease basis is underway before adding new aircraft to the fleet,” she said.
Biman has no information regarding irregularities and corruption in the purchase of aircrafts during Awami League regime.
The Minister said while replying to a written question of BNP lawmaker elected from Pabna 5 Md.shamsur Rahman Simul Biswas.
She said that the Awami League government signed an agreement to purchase new aircraft for Biman from the fiscal year 2008-2009 to the fiscal year 2024-2025.
On August 1, 2018, an agreement was signed between Biman and Canadian Commercial Corporation for the purchase of three Dash8-400 aircraft manufactured by De Havilland Company on a G-to-G (Government to Government) basis between Bangladesh and Canada.
The contracted aircraft were added to the Biman fleet from November 2020 to February 2021, she said.
On October 31, 2019, a purchase agreement was signed with the American aircraft manufacturer Boeing Company for the purchase of two 787-9 passenger aircraft.
The contracted aircraft were added to the Biman fleet in December 2019, the Minister said.
The Minister also said that the government is working to ensure passenger service as promised in the election manifesto.
“Biman has taken initiatives to improve the quality of flight operations and ground handling services, including behavioral changes among employees, and close supervision,” she said.
In addition, the Minister said, the harassment of passengers in collecting tickets has been reduced to a large extent by introducing an online ticketing system.
Despite the insufficient number of aircraft, she said, Biman is trying to achieve On Time Performance (OTP).
“Currently, 80% OTP has been achieved in international and domestic flights,” she said.