SriLankan Airlines says it is rationalizing its services to China in accordance with current market conditions as per its long-held commercial policies, with a temporary reduction of frequencies to several cities. 

“This is to better reflect present passenger demand in the wake of a significant reduction in the number of Chinese travelers venturing overseas following the outbreak of the Novel Coronavirus epidemic,” the national carrier said in a statement.

It said that many airlines have already reduced frequencies to China due to the drop in demand, reasons for which include restrictions by the Government of China on overseas travel of its own citizens. These include four Chinese airlines that operate between Colombo and several Chinese cities.

The airline said that market conditions are constantly evaluated as part of SriLankan’s commercial policies and the reductions are effective from 6th February 2020 until 28th March 2020. 

SriLankan currently operates services to three cities in China, namely Beijing, Shanghai and Canton. The number of weekly flights to Beijing is being reduced from 4 down to 2; Shanghai from 4 to 2; and Canton from 7 to 3.

SriLankan said it is deploying the aircraft released from the China flights to increase capacity in other regions, including upgrading of the Colombo-Abu Dhabi sector to a wide-body aircraft, and to advance scheduled heavy maintenance activities on several aircraft.

SriLankan’s route network spans 116 cities in 51 countries. As a member of the oneworld global airline alliance it also connects passengers to over a thousand cities in more than 180 countries and territories through 13 member airlines.