BIOKAVANGO COP meeting

In his presentation, at the BIOKAVANGO community of practice meeting, Mr. Modise from Civil Aviation gave an interesting and informative talk on current developments in the aviation industry in Botswana. He talked about major extensions to the four main airports of Maun, Francistown, Kasane and Ghanzi. These works include construction and extension to runways, construction of new terminal buildings and new control towers. The impact of these developments would mean job creation, face lifts to old buildings, increased traffic, more belly cargo space on the air crafts and the liberalisation of airspace with bigger planes coming in. However, on the downside, people living on the outskirts of the airport would have to be relocated and in the case of Maun airport, there is a big hole that had been created by previous excavation and need to be filled as it has become a health hazard. Where there has been concerns of noise emanating from the bigger planes, he concluded that more and more airlines are retiring old fleet due to noise pollution.