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Transport: Air Tanzania introduces daily Dar-Arusha flights

State-owned Air Tanzania has introduced a daily flight from Dar es Salaam to Arusha airport to boost revenue for the struggling airline. The move puts the carrier in direct competition with private company Precision Air, which already operates daily flights into Arusha airport from Dar es Salaam.

The new Arusha flight departs Dar es Salaam at 14.00 and lands at 15.20.

Arusha airport is more convenient to Tanzania’s tourist and safari capital than Kilimanjaro international airport. Kilimanjaro is around 60 km from Arusha on the Arusha-Moshi road.

However the fate of Air Tanzania could depend on the outcome of talks between the government and China’s Sonangol, which is reportedly interested in buying 49 per cent of the company in exchange for oil exploration rights in Tanzania. Negotiations were originally announced in 2008 and again in early 2009 and now Bloomberg quotes Air Tanzania’s managing director William Haji as saying that they are in an “advanced stage”.

The talks follow an earlier failed agreement with South African Airlines, which saw the southern African carrier purchase a 49 per cent share in Air Tanzania in 2002 before withdrawing from the deal five years later.

Meanwhile, in early December the airline announced that it had cut 155 out of 337 jobs, or 46 per cent of its staff.

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