Fiji-Tahiti

Cashing In On The NZ, Australia Traffic UTA Plans Second

Air Service

The French airline UTA is planning to start a second weekly service soon between Tahiti and Nadi, Fiji, to cater for the numerous passengers who want to travel between Tahiti and Australia and New Zealand.

AT present, UTA’s one two-way A weekly service between Nadi and Tahiti by DCS jet is the only one on which plane passengers can get m and out of Tahiti if coming from or o o ing to Australia or New Zealand. 8 Until the end of last year such nasseneers had three means of com

munition with Tahiti-by- Qantas

(the Australian airline) and U A Urn Sydney, and by TEAL (ge New Zealand airline) from Auck land However, these services were cancelled after the Australian and French Governments disagreed on Traffic rights for their airlines in Aus tralia and the Pacific.

One of the results of this cancella tion of services was that the Amen can tourist traffic to Tahiti decreased because, although American tour sts ij „ e t into Tahiti easily enough bv air B from California and Hawaii, they could not get onward passages towards New Zealand and Australia.

UTA’s plan to start a second weekly service between Tahiti and Nadi is therefore likely to boost Tahiti’s tourist flow and should prove profitable almost immediately.

UTA is also planning to s P e ed up its service between Pans and Tahit via New Caledonia by reducing the number of stopovers, and by cutting down on the duration of stopovers.

In particular, the stopover at Nadi -100 minutes —will be shortened.

Meanwhile, the airline has a pointed Mr. Michel Vernier to newly-created post of regional din tor in the Pacific with headquarters Papeete. His job will be to devel UTA’s services in the area and promote tourism in French Polynes He has also taken over as direct general of Reseau Aenen Int insulaire (RAI), the internal air s vice in French Polynesia.

Mr. Vernier told the Tahiti ne 1 paper Le Journal de Tahiti in A] that UTA was already bringing m: tourists from France and the Uni States to Tahiti, and that the devel ment of tourism in French Polyn< was conditioned by the capacity the territory’s hotels to accommoc Mr. Vernier added; “If 600 or rooms were available in Fre Polynesia tomorrow, we are absolu convinced that we could easily that number of tourists to use the