Airways NZ wins prestigious Int. industry award

Airways New Zealand wins prestigious international industry award

Airways New Zealand has been recognised as one the best Air Navigation Services Providers in the world at the 2003 World Air Transport Summit in Washington on Tuesday.

The award, presented by the International Air Transport Association which represents over 280 airlines internationally, places Airways New Zealand as one of the top three ANS providers in the world in terms of value-for-money and quality of service.

In presenting the award, Giovanni Bisignani, IATA Director General & CEO, said “Today's winners are good examples for others to follow. They have shown leadership in assisting the air transport industry during the worst crisis in its history. They have displayed the spirit of partnership that will be the key to recovery.”

Ashley Smout, Airways New Zealand’s Chief Executive, says the award is a hugely significant achievement for Airways New Zealand, and coming from our customers – the airlines - is the highest recognition the company could receive.

“We’ve worked extremely hard over recent years to achieve our status as one of the world’s lowest-cost air navigation services providers,” said Mr Smout.

“But it hasn’t been easy - our commitment was tested when we decided to restructure our business some five years ago. This involved consolidating our business to one centre, with considerable upheaval for our people, and costs to our shareholder.”

“However our customers benefited, and we have been able to hold prices during the post September 11 downturn, and even work with our customer airlines to help them endure what has been a particularly challenging time for airlines globally.”

“This award is a special tribute to the staff at Airways who were significantly affected when we needed to reorganise our business several years ago to contain costs,” said Mr Smout.

The sixth annual 'Eagle' awards were announced at the 59th IATA Annual General Meeting and World Air Transport Summit in Washington D.C. They were decided by an independent selection panel.

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