The chief executive of Edinburgh Airport has estimated its annual contribution to the economy will have risen to at least £1.6 billion, as he anticipates further growth and another record year for passenger numbers.
Gordon Dewar also highlighted the importance of the jobs provided by the airport and other employers on the “campus”, in an exclusive interview with The Herald. He observed this employment totalled nearly 8,000, including around 1,000 people employed directly by the airport.
And Mr Dewar declared: “It is obvious that airports are profoundly important for local economies, particularly island economies such as ours. I am a geographer by background. I am a transport operator my whole career.”
He also underlined the attractiveness of Edinburgh as a destination for overseas visitors. And he flagged the lift Edinburgh Airport provided to the tourism sector, and vice-versa.
Mr Dewar highlighted his confidence that Edinburgh Airport would handle more than 16 million passengers this year, setting another all-time high to exceed the record of 15.78 million it achieved in 2024.
The best journalism in Edinburgh – now for just £1 for 3 months.
In 2012, the year in which he took up the top job at the airport, the passenger total was 9.19m.
Mr Dewar said: “We are confident we will exceed 16 million this year. We have a number in mind. We are currently advising our shareholders.
“We will definitely have a record year. I would hope to outperform even the [figure] we have shared with our shareholders. We are ahead of our forecasts in the first four months of the year.”
Edinburgh Airport was estimated in a 2020 report by Biggar Economics to have contributed £1.4bn to the economy on the gross value added (GVA) measure in 2019 - a year in which it exceeded 14m passengers.
Noting the economic contribution amounted to around £100 per passenger, Mr Dewar said of the current position: “We should be up to £1.6bn of GVA or a bit higher, if my rule of thumb works.”
He said: “You can sort of do the maths. That ratio won’t have changed much. The reason I say that with much confidence [is] the only thing that would change that would be if there was a substantial mix change.”
Highlighting improvements in the mix of passenger traffic from an economic contribution perspective, Mr Dewar added: “The ratio of international [traffic] we have is higher. All the growth is international. We have increased our proportion of inbound. The American routes - they tend to be stronger inbound demand than other…routes.”
He flagged the various components of the economic contribution of Edinburgh Airport - which has been majority-owned by Paris-based VINCI Airports since last year - as well as the fact that the benefits flow well beyond the city.
READ MORE:
- Edinburgh's West Town: A new city rising – or a chance slipping away?
- What is West Town? How 'UK's biggest urban extension' will take shape
Mr Dewar said: “Obviously, there is a direct spend [with] tourism, a direct economic contribution, essentially an export market.”
He also highlighted people using the airport to travel to universities and the importance of connectivity for “people doing business and selling goods or selling services”.
While observing the economic contribution was “focused in the central belt and around Edinburgh”, he highlighted the fact that the benefits of tourism through the airport were felt “on Skye, in the Outer Hebrides, in the Borders and so on”.
Flagging Edinburgh Airport’s provision of some services not available elsewhere, he said: “We are called Edinburgh Airport but we are Scotland’s airport.”
Read more:
- Holiday companies and airlines revelations are eye-catching
- Flights win 'game changer' for Scottish airport
- Flights 'first' as Scottish airport hails arrival of major airline
Highlighting growth ambitions, Mr Dewar said: “The only question is how far can we go, how fast can we go.
“We work on a pipeline of 50, 60, 70 routes a year, confident we will get between five and 20 of them. What we see is all the things that are driving the value of Edinburgh, certainly in relative terms.”
He added: “The economy of Edinburgh is doing better than most of the non-London UK.”
Mr Dewar also flagged outperformance in tourism and student development.
He also highlighted the part that the airport could play in social inclusion.
Mr Dewar said: “How do we tap into communities that have maybe struggled before?”
He added that the airport needed that workforce for the future.
Asked about social inclusion, he replied: “The positives are largely driven by the career opportunities at the airport. I don’t mean just us. We have a very large campus – people have built a career at the airport.”
He highlighted the fact that the airport campus was somewhere people could “come without a degree…and build a career”.
Mr Dewar noted that people could move into senior roles from such a start at the airport campus, highlighting the variety of jobs on offer.
He declared: “We have a really good opportunity to do that.”
Mr Dewar said the airport prided itself on the number of opportunities it offers for people joining from school or as graduates from universities, and its provision of internships and apprenticeships.
He added: “They have ended up building a career here.”
Noting the many different jobs provided by Edinburgh Airport itself, he said: “We have everything from car park drivers to security officers to accountants to finance people to analysts. It is an incredibly diverse business.”
Mr Dewar noted the Scottish tourism market is “facing into a new challenge”, with cost pressures, adding: “They need high-value demand.”
He highlighted the good job being done by tourism providers and the fact that Scotland was “still growing that market as a country”.
Mr Dewar noted that international tourists generally had to arrive in Scotland by air.
He said that, apart from domestic tourists, “everyone else, [from] Europe, Americans, Asians, is flying”, observing: “They might come here via London.”
Highlighting the importance of the airport winning new routes and services, Mr Dewar added: “The more we can connect and the easier we can make these connections, the better chance Scottish tourism has in attracting people to spend their money.”
He observed that, in terms of tourism from America, Scotland has the “best numbers” it has ever had.
Mr Dewar added: “Not only are they coming in greater numbers but they are staying longer.”
Edinburgh Airport has enjoyed significant success in winning direct North American flights in recent times.
Mr Dewar highlighted the fact that more direct flights from the US meant Americans might now - instead of travelling through London and spending four or five days of a two-week holiday in Scotland as they did previously - now land in and fly from Scotland and spend the “whole fortnight” in Scotland.
He declared: “All of these things are good news, tapping into the [American market].”
Mr Dewar said of Edinburgh: “It is an iconic destination, in its own right: the castle, whether you are into Harry Potter, whether you have Scottish connections or not, it is one of those iconic cities, the Festival.
“Landing in Scotland and seeing the rest of the country is seen as very accessible.”
Mr Dewar highlighted the strong growth enjoyed by Edinburgh Airport.
He said: “We were already one of the fastest-growing airports in Europe pre-Covid. We were then one of the fastest-recovering airports in Europe post-Covid. There are many airports haven’t got back to 2019 levels yet. We are way ahead of that.”
In terms of growth among European airports, Mr Dewar added: “We might not always be best all the time but we are going to be in the upper quartile for the foreseeable future…within Europe.”
He observed “the Indian market is pretty hard to beat at the moment” in terms of the growth of airports.
Share