BARIG, the association of international and German airlines operating in Germany, is observing with great concern that in view of the COVID-19 pandemic, individual countries (within the EU and worldwide) are increasingly introducing individual travel restrictions.

Travel Restrictions: the pandemic management must be coordinated, transparent and at the highest level

Close coordination urgently required and critical to success

These uncoordinated measures lead to a difficult to manage patchwork of regulations, which causes massive uncertainty among travelers. The urgently needed international "track and tracing" solution that creates compatibility between the individual state apps and enables data exchange is still missing. Instead, the pandemic management must be coordinated, transparent and at the highest level in order to regain the trust of travelers and to help the heavily burdened international economy to get back up on its feet.

“Countries that have adopted uncoordinated individual travel restrictions and regulations need to urgently rethink their actions,” states BARIG Secretary General Michael Hoppe. “Joint, coordinated action by the international community, which also needs to be based on the recommendations of the expert bodies of ICAO, EASA and ECDC, is essential for overcoming the global economic consequences of the pandemic.”

Measures must reflect joint recommendations from ICAO, EASA and ECDC

The specific demands of BARIG include:

• Joint assessment of the COVID-19 situation within the EU and worldwide by the responsible state ministries and higher-level institutions such as the European Commission and a coordinated procedure derived from this.
• Coordinated implementation of the "Take-Off Aviation Health Safety" protocol developed by ICAO, EASA and ECDC.
• Compatibility of the tracing apps published by the states.
• Clear information for the travelers about possible measures always in coordination with the travel industry.

Clear rules are essential for the recovery of the global economy

Michael Hoppe: “Travel restrictions not only hurt the aviation industry extremely, but also have a heavy impact on the European as well as global economy, and delay the urgently needed recovery enormously.

The cooperation of the international community and the close coordination of measures are essential to ensure that travelers fly safely and enable the sustainable reactivation of the economic cycle simultaneously.

With the comprehensive protection and hygiene measures at the airports as well as on board the aircraft, the aviation industry enables people to have a health-friendly transport."