During the political and ethnic unrest period, the number of
passengers at Nikola Tesla Airport dropped sharply from 2.8 million
in 1990 to only 350 thousand in 1994 (see Fig. 1). At that time, a
broad range of problems persisted in the Serbian economy resulting
in the sparse demand for air travel: hyperinflation at an unprecedented
rate, low income and large proportions of the
population living in extreme poverty. Under such circumstances
the national flag carrier, Jat Airways, struggled to survive, plagued
with low productivity and lower quality of services. The number of
passengers, which was over 4.5 million in the period of “golden years” (in the late 1980s), fell to less than a million in 1992.
Nevertheless, the national carrier retained the dominant market
position on the majority of its routes, operating 33 routes out of the
37 routes at Belgrade Airport in 2001.