BELARUS. National carrier Belavia Belarusian Airlines is preparing to relaunch inflight duty free services later this year.
The airline aims to commence services in time for the FIFA World Cup in Russia this summer, a spokesperson confirmed to The Moodie Davitt Report.
The airline has already selected a Belarusian chain of duty free shops to manage the service. Belavia will officially announce the partner when the service commences.
“We have experienced demand from passengers for duty free onboard,” the spokesperson said. “We used to offer inflight duty free a long time ago, but due to changes in legislation we had to suspend this service.”
Currently, Somlen and Helen & Valery/Belamarket (supplied by Gebr Heinemann) represent the largest network of duty free shops in Belarus, including at Minsk Airport.
Belavia Director General Anatoly Gusarov announced the move to reinstate inflight duty free to local press on Wednesday 14 February. He also hailed a new five-day visa-free travel programme introduced last year that has boosted passenger numbers.
Citizens from 80 countries including those in the EU, Brazil, Indonesia, the USA and Japan can now visit Belarus visa-free.
“We have responded to this initiative and developed a special tariff. Many passengers fly to and from [Belarus] from cities such as Warsaw, Prague, and Milan this way. There were a great number of passengers on New Year’s Eve and Christmas Eve. In total, over 80,000 people entered the country visa-free in 2017, and our share stands at 60-65%,” said Gusarov.
Belavia is set to start flights to Kazan and Rostov-on-Don in Russia ahead of the 2018 FIFA World Cup. “These are the World Cup host cities. We get quite a few applications from American and European structures. We thoroughly examine them and come up with the best offers for the football fans,” he said.
