论文部分内容阅读
Feng Yu is an architect with a famous Shanghai-based enterprise. He usually ook business travels because of his duties. Thus he spent a lot of time in the airports.
When he was waiting for boarding, he usually had a dinner or a cup of coffee or went to the bookstore in the airport. And when he was going to return from Shanghai, he usually bought some local products in the stores of local airports as gifts for his friends and relatives. After a long while, Feng Yu got to know the price level in the airport and found that the prices of things sold there were much higher than outside of the airport.
Feng Yu did not pay too much attention to this at first. However, as he went out more and more frequently, he found that things were different in foreign airports as the commodity prices would not differ that much in and out of airports. “Why could ordinary things be so expensive in airports?” Feng Yu wondered.
In order to solve this problem, CBF journalists made on-the-spot surveys in different airports in China. The results of the survey were listed in Table 1.
From Table 1 we can see that prices of things at least double when they are moved from shopping malls to airports. Actually, it is no longer a secret and the retailers or suppliers that sell things in airports take it for granted. An anonymous operator of a bookstore in the Ningbo Airport said: “The airport increased the rent of stores year by year at a certain rate. Sometimes the increase rate is over 50%. We have no way but to increase the prices of what we are selling, or else we are not able to pay the rent and will be forced out of the airport one day.”
Gao Yuanyang, director of the General Aviation Industry Research Center at the Beijing University of Aeronautics & Astronautics, told CBF journalists that airports were not only places for business operation and they also function as a place of social and public service in a city. “Airports can be profitable, but they can not cross the line in that field.”
How Exorbitant Profits Come to Airports?
First, let’s take a look at the income pattern of the airport.
Generally speaking, the income of an airport is divided into the income from aviation-related business and nonaviation-related business. The former refers to the income brought by the landing and taking-off of planes, transportation of passengers and cargos and other fundamental business, such as the fees of planes’ landing, taking off and parking, service charges for passengers and security check fees. The nonaviation-related income is a result from the services generated along with the fundamental businesses, such as renting stores, catering, entertainment, advertising, plane maintenance and repair and so on. The aviation-related income of an airport is limited by the size, location, passenger flow volume and so on. Thus it is hard to earn a large amount of profits from this section. In comparison, the non-aviation-related income is more flexible and serves as the main source of profits for the airport. Many airports also outsource their retail, cater- ing and advertising business to professional institutions and ask for basic entry fees and dividends from the income of stores or restaurants. These charges indirectly increase the price level.
On March 1, 2008, the Plan of Reform to the Charges in Civil Airports was officially carried out, according to which the pattern of charging in airports were shifted from unified charge standard to segmented charges. The non-aviationrelated income was divided into important non-aviation income and other incomes. The important non-aviation income includes the rent of first class, business class of the plane, rent of offices in airports, service fees of selling the tickets, and other kinds of on-land services while the rest are categorized as other income.
According to this plan, the aviationrelated services and the services related with non-aviation business are priced under the guidance of the government. The government fixes the benchmark price and the fluctuation rate. The airports and airlines fix the substantial prices based on the benchmark price and facilities and services in the airports. The price is directly related with the volume of passenger flow or cargo transportation. The price of other nonaviation business is oriented by the market, which is flexible and directly related with the operating pattern of airports.
Gao Yuanyang thought that the prices of things sold in China’s airports are indeed at a high level, but the situation varies to places. “The airports in Beijing and Guangzhou are doing a good job as the commodities are sold at reasonable prices. The commodity prices are extremely high in the airports of some second- and third-tier cities,”Gao Yuanyang said. The passenger flow volume in these airports is not large and the aviation-related income is low or even loss occurred to them. There- fore, the non-aviation income takes the dominant place. “The airports are actually managed by corporate entities and it is right for them to pursue profits. But they should be told that airports also function as a place of providing public services. Airports can be profitable, but they cannot be greedy.” In addition, the 38th clause of the Management Rules of Civil Airports, which was carried out as of July 1, 2009, made it clear that enterprises can operate retail, catering and on-land services in airports after the transfer of operating rights. The airport management institution should reach agreements with enterprises having got the right of operating business in airports according to the requirements of relevant regulatory department, in which they should define the service standard, price level, safety speculations and responsibilities.
In Gao Yuanyang’s opinion, it is natural for airports to increase the rents for higher profits as a commercial entity. In addition, the price supervision department holds open attitudes towards the prices of some commodities and services, which is hard and improper to be fixed by the government department. But this does not mean that the government can turn a deaf ear on the exorbitant prices in airports; instead, they should take measures to deal with the price problem.
Gao Yuanyang stressed that the development of airport should not be only related with its profitability while the safety, level of services for airlines and customers’ satisfaction level are playing a more important role in that field.
Used to Be a Hot Potato
Li Jiaxiang, director of the Civil Aviation Administration of China, said that China planned to establish 70 new airports and expand (reconstruct) 100 existing airports. By the end of 2014, the number of airports in China would exceed 230 and increase to 240 by 2020 with the maximal passenger flow volume of 700 million people.
Compared with the boom of airports at present, they were always accompanied with loss before the reform of land ownership. In June 2003, the National Bureau of Statistics found after auditions that most of the 12 main airports and 38 regional airports had losses. The detailed results are that 9 of 12 main airports suffered losses and 6 of them had severe losses. The situation for regional airports was worse as 37 of them encountered losses. The total loss of these companies reached 1.527 billion yuan from 2000 to 2001 and some of them had to stop flights because of the severe losses.
The report was submitted to the National People’s Congress, stating that the fundamental reason was the insuffi- cient reform to the civil aviation system with the disconnection of investment and construction of airports from their operation. This made it hard to form a decision-making system and a risk control system. Local governments took part in the construction of airports, which were mostly run by civil aviation departments, resulting in the lack of systematic planning. The reform to land ownership means to decentralize the airports to the provinces where they are located along with relevant assets, debts and staff. The reform was finished in 2004.
But then the problem came.
When the management rights of airports were decentralized to local governments, the debts and burdens generated in the construction of airports were also given to them. In addition, local governments were not enthusiastic in building or expanding airports which had severe losses and sold those underperformed airports to those big ones, which helped the formation of monopolization.
Presently, losses are still haunting some airports with a low passenger flow volume. They are more eager to offset the loss with non-aviation income. That explains why prices in small airports are that high. However, it is worthwhile to mention that in order to maintain the normal operation of airports, governments usually gave subsidies to them. It is known that the airports in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen received the government subsidies of 45.5275 million yuan last year.
“The subsidies from the government just show that airports are not simply commercial institutions. They are just a place to provide social services and the commodities there should be sold at a normal price,” Gao Yuanyang said. Compared with developed countries, prices of commodities sold in airports are relatively high and it needs some time for the charges in China’s airports to meet the international standard. Presently China is preparing for a reform to the charges in airports but when and how it is going to be implemented remains unknown.
When the “Construction Fee of Airports” Comes to the End?
When passengers are still complaining about the exorbitant prices of things sold in airports, the Ministry of Finance issued the notice, which caused the anger of passengers again. The new notice was named “Temporary Management Measures for Collecting and Using the Funds of Civil Aviation Development”, according to which every passenger taking domestic airlines should pay 50 yuan as the fund of civil aviation development and each passenger taking international airlines needs to pay 90 yuan.
The said civil aviation development fund has a more familiar name – the“construction fee of airports”. Though the latter has been cancelled, its “twin”policy closely followed with the same charges. What does this mean? In Gao Yuanyang’s opinion, previously the construction fee of airports could be only used for the construction of airports. Now they can be more widely used as the fund of civil aviation development, including the operation of airports, construction of subsidiary airports and support for general aviation airports. “In the past people taking flights were high-end persons who were not sensitive to prices. But now flights have become a routine transportation method for the masses. Ordinary passengers are sensitive to prices and now the inflation makes things worse. It is normal for them to have complaints about any additional expenditure.”
Then, what is the construction fee of airports or the civil aviation development fund and whether it should exist or not?
The construction fee of airports began to be collected in 1992 in Wenzhou. This was because the airport in Wenzhou was not invested by the government. Then, the airports followed suit and successively collected this kind of fees.
In 1995, the Ministry of Finance and the State Administration of Civil Aviation worked out a rule, fixing the construction fee for domestic airlines at 50 yuan/passenger and the one for international airlines at 90 yuan/passenger. The new rule gave the construction fee of airports a legal identity.
In the past 20 years of collecting construction fee of airports, the income and expenditure were only partially open to the public with a certain part remaining unknown.
According to the public data from the Ministry of Finance, the construction fees of airports collected in 2011 totaled 14.708 billion yuan and the investment in building, expanding and reconstructing airports amounted to 13.902 billion yuan.
“In the past the government has not enough financial power when the construction of airports met its boom. It is understandable for them to collect the construction fee of airports to support the construction and development of airports. But now, there is no longer massive construction of airports and the government fiscal ability has drastically increased. This means the construction fee of airports, or any of its twins, is no longer reasonable to maintain their existence,” said Gao Yuanyang.
When he was waiting for boarding, he usually had a dinner or a cup of coffee or went to the bookstore in the airport. And when he was going to return from Shanghai, he usually bought some local products in the stores of local airports as gifts for his friends and relatives. After a long while, Feng Yu got to know the price level in the airport and found that the prices of things sold there were much higher than outside of the airport.
Feng Yu did not pay too much attention to this at first. However, as he went out more and more frequently, he found that things were different in foreign airports as the commodity prices would not differ that much in and out of airports. “Why could ordinary things be so expensive in airports?” Feng Yu wondered.
In order to solve this problem, CBF journalists made on-the-spot surveys in different airports in China. The results of the survey were listed in Table 1.
From Table 1 we can see that prices of things at least double when they are moved from shopping malls to airports. Actually, it is no longer a secret and the retailers or suppliers that sell things in airports take it for granted. An anonymous operator of a bookstore in the Ningbo Airport said: “The airport increased the rent of stores year by year at a certain rate. Sometimes the increase rate is over 50%. We have no way but to increase the prices of what we are selling, or else we are not able to pay the rent and will be forced out of the airport one day.”
Gao Yuanyang, director of the General Aviation Industry Research Center at the Beijing University of Aeronautics & Astronautics, told CBF journalists that airports were not only places for business operation and they also function as a place of social and public service in a city. “Airports can be profitable, but they can not cross the line in that field.”
How Exorbitant Profits Come to Airports?
First, let’s take a look at the income pattern of the airport.
Generally speaking, the income of an airport is divided into the income from aviation-related business and nonaviation-related business. The former refers to the income brought by the landing and taking-off of planes, transportation of passengers and cargos and other fundamental business, such as the fees of planes’ landing, taking off and parking, service charges for passengers and security check fees. The nonaviation-related income is a result from the services generated along with the fundamental businesses, such as renting stores, catering, entertainment, advertising, plane maintenance and repair and so on. The aviation-related income of an airport is limited by the size, location, passenger flow volume and so on. Thus it is hard to earn a large amount of profits from this section. In comparison, the non-aviation-related income is more flexible and serves as the main source of profits for the airport. Many airports also outsource their retail, cater- ing and advertising business to professional institutions and ask for basic entry fees and dividends from the income of stores or restaurants. These charges indirectly increase the price level.
On March 1, 2008, the Plan of Reform to the Charges in Civil Airports was officially carried out, according to which the pattern of charging in airports were shifted from unified charge standard to segmented charges. The non-aviationrelated income was divided into important non-aviation income and other incomes. The important non-aviation income includes the rent of first class, business class of the plane, rent of offices in airports, service fees of selling the tickets, and other kinds of on-land services while the rest are categorized as other income.
According to this plan, the aviationrelated services and the services related with non-aviation business are priced under the guidance of the government. The government fixes the benchmark price and the fluctuation rate. The airports and airlines fix the substantial prices based on the benchmark price and facilities and services in the airports. The price is directly related with the volume of passenger flow or cargo transportation. The price of other nonaviation business is oriented by the market, which is flexible and directly related with the operating pattern of airports.
Gao Yuanyang thought that the prices of things sold in China’s airports are indeed at a high level, but the situation varies to places. “The airports in Beijing and Guangzhou are doing a good job as the commodities are sold at reasonable prices. The commodity prices are extremely high in the airports of some second- and third-tier cities,”Gao Yuanyang said. The passenger flow volume in these airports is not large and the aviation-related income is low or even loss occurred to them. There- fore, the non-aviation income takes the dominant place. “The airports are actually managed by corporate entities and it is right for them to pursue profits. But they should be told that airports also function as a place of providing public services. Airports can be profitable, but they cannot be greedy.” In addition, the 38th clause of the Management Rules of Civil Airports, which was carried out as of July 1, 2009, made it clear that enterprises can operate retail, catering and on-land services in airports after the transfer of operating rights. The airport management institution should reach agreements with enterprises having got the right of operating business in airports according to the requirements of relevant regulatory department, in which they should define the service standard, price level, safety speculations and responsibilities.
In Gao Yuanyang’s opinion, it is natural for airports to increase the rents for higher profits as a commercial entity. In addition, the price supervision department holds open attitudes towards the prices of some commodities and services, which is hard and improper to be fixed by the government department. But this does not mean that the government can turn a deaf ear on the exorbitant prices in airports; instead, they should take measures to deal with the price problem.
Gao Yuanyang stressed that the development of airport should not be only related with its profitability while the safety, level of services for airlines and customers’ satisfaction level are playing a more important role in that field.
Used to Be a Hot Potato
Li Jiaxiang, director of the Civil Aviation Administration of China, said that China planned to establish 70 new airports and expand (reconstruct) 100 existing airports. By the end of 2014, the number of airports in China would exceed 230 and increase to 240 by 2020 with the maximal passenger flow volume of 700 million people.
Compared with the boom of airports at present, they were always accompanied with loss before the reform of land ownership. In June 2003, the National Bureau of Statistics found after auditions that most of the 12 main airports and 38 regional airports had losses. The detailed results are that 9 of 12 main airports suffered losses and 6 of them had severe losses. The situation for regional airports was worse as 37 of them encountered losses. The total loss of these companies reached 1.527 billion yuan from 2000 to 2001 and some of them had to stop flights because of the severe losses.
The report was submitted to the National People’s Congress, stating that the fundamental reason was the insuffi- cient reform to the civil aviation system with the disconnection of investment and construction of airports from their operation. This made it hard to form a decision-making system and a risk control system. Local governments took part in the construction of airports, which were mostly run by civil aviation departments, resulting in the lack of systematic planning. The reform to land ownership means to decentralize the airports to the provinces where they are located along with relevant assets, debts and staff. The reform was finished in 2004.
But then the problem came.
When the management rights of airports were decentralized to local governments, the debts and burdens generated in the construction of airports were also given to them. In addition, local governments were not enthusiastic in building or expanding airports which had severe losses and sold those underperformed airports to those big ones, which helped the formation of monopolization.
Presently, losses are still haunting some airports with a low passenger flow volume. They are more eager to offset the loss with non-aviation income. That explains why prices in small airports are that high. However, it is worthwhile to mention that in order to maintain the normal operation of airports, governments usually gave subsidies to them. It is known that the airports in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen received the government subsidies of 45.5275 million yuan last year.
“The subsidies from the government just show that airports are not simply commercial institutions. They are just a place to provide social services and the commodities there should be sold at a normal price,” Gao Yuanyang said. Compared with developed countries, prices of commodities sold in airports are relatively high and it needs some time for the charges in China’s airports to meet the international standard. Presently China is preparing for a reform to the charges in airports but when and how it is going to be implemented remains unknown.
When the “Construction Fee of Airports” Comes to the End?
When passengers are still complaining about the exorbitant prices of things sold in airports, the Ministry of Finance issued the notice, which caused the anger of passengers again. The new notice was named “Temporary Management Measures for Collecting and Using the Funds of Civil Aviation Development”, according to which every passenger taking domestic airlines should pay 50 yuan as the fund of civil aviation development and each passenger taking international airlines needs to pay 90 yuan.
The said civil aviation development fund has a more familiar name – the“construction fee of airports”. Though the latter has been cancelled, its “twin”policy closely followed with the same charges. What does this mean? In Gao Yuanyang’s opinion, previously the construction fee of airports could be only used for the construction of airports. Now they can be more widely used as the fund of civil aviation development, including the operation of airports, construction of subsidiary airports and support for general aviation airports. “In the past people taking flights were high-end persons who were not sensitive to prices. But now flights have become a routine transportation method for the masses. Ordinary passengers are sensitive to prices and now the inflation makes things worse. It is normal for them to have complaints about any additional expenditure.”
Then, what is the construction fee of airports or the civil aviation development fund and whether it should exist or not?
The construction fee of airports began to be collected in 1992 in Wenzhou. This was because the airport in Wenzhou was not invested by the government. Then, the airports followed suit and successively collected this kind of fees.
In 1995, the Ministry of Finance and the State Administration of Civil Aviation worked out a rule, fixing the construction fee for domestic airlines at 50 yuan/passenger and the one for international airlines at 90 yuan/passenger. The new rule gave the construction fee of airports a legal identity.
In the past 20 years of collecting construction fee of airports, the income and expenditure were only partially open to the public with a certain part remaining unknown.
According to the public data from the Ministry of Finance, the construction fees of airports collected in 2011 totaled 14.708 billion yuan and the investment in building, expanding and reconstructing airports amounted to 13.902 billion yuan.
“In the past the government has not enough financial power when the construction of airports met its boom. It is understandable for them to collect the construction fee of airports to support the construction and development of airports. But now, there is no longer massive construction of airports and the government fiscal ability has drastically increased. This means the construction fee of airports, or any of its twins, is no longer reasonable to maintain their existence,” said Gao Yuanyang.