Air Mauritius Plans Two Additional Weekly Flights to Shanghai

Air Mauritius Ltd. (AML) plans to add two weekly, non-stop flights to Shanghai this year, said Donald Payen, executive vice president, commercial at Sub-Saharan Africa’s fourth-largest airline.

The first flight is scheduled for March 26 and the second for October, depending on demand, Payen said in a mobile-phone interview today. “We have witnessed tremendous growth since our first flight to Shanghai with a stopover in Kuala Lumpur on July 5 last year.”

Tourist arrivals from China almost doubled to 13,871 in the 11 months through November 2011 compared with a year earlier, according to Statistics Mauritius. Payen forecast their numbers would more than double to 28,000 this year.

Tourism is one of Mauritius’s two biggest sources of foreign-currency and 1.01 million visitors are expected this year, according to the Port Louis-based data agency. It forecast income would rise 4.7 percent to 44.5 billion rupees ($1.5 billion).

To contact the reporter on this story: Kamlesh Bhuckory in Port Louis via Johannesburg at 1933 or gbell16@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Antony Sguazzin in Johannesburg at asguazzin@bloomberg.net