Sixteen new airline routes have begun operating to and from Malta this year. 14 out of these have already begun while the other two will begin at the end of May and at the end of June respectively.

Most of the new routes are Ryanair flights to Billund, Krakow, Marseilles, Seville, Valencia, Bologna, Leeds and Bournemouth. Easyjet introduced flights to Rome, Malpensa and Liverpool, BMI Baby added an East Midlands route, while Norwegian began flights to Oslo and Copenhagen.

Air Malta also introduced new routes to Turin and Genoa. Malta is now linked to 76 airports in Europe, nrthern Africa, the Middle East and the Persian Gulf, not including chartered flights.

Athough Air Malta remains a staple part of air transport, low-cost airlines are also playing a significant role in strengthening the tourism sector. Despite the tourism crisis last year, low-cost airlines increased the number of passengers by 2.3% with low-cost airlines carrying 22.95% of all arrivals and departures last year.

This year, the number of aircraft seats is set to be increased by 220,000 or 7.5% over that of last year.

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