Press Release

Issued by Asian Business Aviation Association.

March 24, 2017

AsBAA, Asia's largest non-profit representative trade body for business and general aviation today welcomed a new announcement from the Civil Aviation Authority of China (CAAC) regarding the rollout of a two-year pilot plan project, designed to support and grow GA across four regions within China. These initiatives by the CAAC and the central government's National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) will continue to support and build on AsBAA's long-term advocacy for and promotion of the continuous development of GA across greater China.

AsBAA vice chairman, Kevin Wu shared, “This is a very encouraging move from the CAAC and one that will benefit the business and general aviation industries in greater China. From this announcement we expect to see further cooperation between associations like AsBAA with one of the largest member based lobby groups in the region and CAAC with a view to working together in simplifying regulatory oversight and creating win-win outcomes for the private and public sectors. AsBAA will continue to offer its full support and resources of its members with the CAAC and other economic development bodies to represent the interests of its members and the Chinese people.”

This welcomed announcement comes ahead of the biggest general aviation conference and exhibition event, ABACE in Shanghai, China. Both NBAA, the National Business Aviation Association, and AsBAA co-host ABACE17, which is being held from the 10-13 April 2017 at the Hawker Pacific private jet terminal at Honqiao International Airport, Shanghai, China. Speaking about this year's show, AsBAA's China committee chair, Rocky Zhang commented, “This announcement of several pilot plans being initiated across China by the CAAC is very timely; in fact ABACE is hosting two education sessions this year specifically on GA topics, such as GA infrastructure, risks, open skies and UAV development, all topics directly affected by these schemes. We encourage industry players and media alike to attend ABACE17 which will have many talented industry speakers discussing the rise of the UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) and GA in the region and what is needed for sustainable development”.

The CAAC pilot project plans will cover the following four regions of China: Northeastern, Eastern, Northwest and Xinjiang. The plans will seek to improve efficiency and management of services and regulations relating to general aviation as follows:

Northeast region

- Examine and simplify the business license, approval and operation permit process.

- Study the feasibility of removing the existing business license and operation permit (by category).

- Implement GA specific airport fee policy and implement GA airports.

- Remove current evaluation of “GA Accident Proneness” and “GA Accident Rate” for non-commercial GA operators.

- Simplify the regulatory oversight and surveillance of non-commercial activities, strengthen commercial transportation oversight.

- Classify security management and simplify security requirement for GA airports and GA operators.

Eastern region

- Introduce GA Management Service Platform and Drone Research & Test Flight Base Construction Pilot Project.

- Set-up Eastern Region GA service centre – to establish an integrated, professional GA service platform with an integrated service system with private company operations, network support and extended service;

- Establish a professional, multi-functional administration departments, processes and channels for an integrated government service window.

- Explore drone research and test flight management; set up specialised zone for test flight base equipped with ground surveillance system.

Northwest region

- Introduce Low Altitude Air Space Surveillance and Service operations.

- Set-up GA low altitude air space surveillance and service system to monitor all GA operators in the area.

- Integrate intelligence information from civil aviation and control military measures to build low altitude air space control service platform 

Xinjiang region

- Support the growth of General Aviation and Tourism in the region.

Permit and facilitate GA operators to perform air tourism operations over radius of 40 km (basically to extend the radius limit to 300km) with CAAC authorization.