regulating and restricting access t

regulating and restricting access to the air transport market today
are likely to be gradually replaced by “more open” multilateral
agreements in the next few years or abolished altogether. Rules
linking an airline’s traffic rights to the nationality of its owner and
thus obstructing mergers in the industry will probably also be
relaxed.
In the past, the normal result of liberalisation moves was lower ticket
prices, higher frequencies on certain routes, a rising number of
connections and a greater degree of choice for customers. Given a
more liberal market environment the necessary consolidation of the
industry would naturally also progress more quickly, especially if at
the same time government subsidies for moribund airlines were cut
back and privatisation efforts were intensified.2