Amman, the Royal Jordanian general assembly held its ordinary annual general meeting on March 28 at the Sheraton Hotel, Amman, presided by Nasser Lozi, chairman of the Royal Jordanian board of directors.

Attending were members of the board of directors, the airlines' president and chief executive officer Amer Hadidi, Omar Saeed chief finance officer, the Jordan's Ministry of Trade and Industry companies’ general comptroller Burhan Akroush, auditors Ernst and Young and shareholders holding 60 percentage of the company capital.

Lozi’s said Royal Jordanian celebrates its 50th anniversary this year seeks to increase its capital from JD84.3 million to JD184.3 million. While pointed the government approved to maintain its 26 percentage ownership in Royal Jordanian’s new capital and is reviewing means to raise the capital. 

The airline is preparing to introduce the 11 Boeing 787s, the first batch of which is to join the fleet in the third quarter of 2014. The seat factor went up from 70 percentages in 2011 to 73 percentage last year as the number of travelers increased by 6 percentages, from 3.2 million to 3.4 million, even though the number of flights and flying hours remained unchanged, at 40,000 and 116,000, respectively. 

Total earnings amounted to JD 802 million in 2012, marking a 9 percentage growth over the JD736 million recorded in the previous year.

Royal Jordanian was capable to lower its operation expenditure by 1 percentage, bringing it down to JD722.8 million last year from JD728.6 million the year before.

The company achieved a JD79.2 million gross profit last year, 968 percentages higher than the JD7.4 million posted in 2011. 

Lozi added the growth in earnings and the relative decline in costs enabled the company to reverse the JD57.9 million net loss of 2011 into a JD1.1 million net profit in 2012. He stressed that the net profit of 2012 could have been much better had the fuel prices not exceeded $110 per barrel. The fuel bill Royal Jordanian paid reached JD290 million, similar to the amount paid in 2011.

The fuel bill in 2012 accounted for about 40 percentage of Royal Jordanian’s overall operational costs, although Royal Jordanian had several fuel hedging contracts that covered around 31 percentage of the total fuel consumption.

Lozi further mentioned pilots executed a program that culminated in a JD10.3 million saving in managing and adhering to flight plans.

Amer Hadidi said that the airline is planning a strategy for the coming five years that will enable it to tap into sources of revenues other than those generated by the transport of passengers and air cargo, and these include providing ground-handling services to other carriers operating at Arab airports, besides those at Queen Alia International Airport, as well as offering maintenance services to other airlines after Royal Jordanian’s new hangar is inaugurated. This is expected to increase the Royal Jordanian share value and the return on shares, maximizing the value of the airline in the coming few years.

Hadidi added that another aspect of the strategy will focus on modernizing the fleet and getting into new regional and international markets where Royal Jordanian has a strong competitive edge.


* One Jordanian Dinar (JD) equals 1.41 US Dollar ($)