“Ceremony for the Commissioning of AACM’s New Office and President Chan Weng Hong’s Inauguration”

To cope with the rapid growth of Macao’s aviation, the Civil Aviation Authority (AACM) has been recruiting more staff to prepare for the large amount of administrative and inspection work in the future which is expected to arise from the liberalization of the market. In order to provide adequate working space for staff, with the coordination of the Office for the Development of Infrastructures (Gabinete para o Desenvolvimento de Infra-estruturas), AACM started the preparation work for a new office since last year. Inaugurated by the Secretary for Transport and Public Works, Eng. Ao Mn Long, the ceremony for the commissioning of the new office was held on 31 March 2006, along with the President’s inauguration. The new office is located on the 18th floor of Centro Comercial Cheng Feng on Alameda Dr. Carlos Assumpção, 336-342. In addition to providing a more spacious area, an independent zone is specially assigned to handle licensing as AACM expects more and more aviation license holders to come up after the new airlines have commenced operation. Besides the commissioning ceremony, Secretary Ao Man Long also appointed Mr. Chan Weng Hong to be President of AACM on the same day. Mr. Chan started his career in AACM since 1994 as senior technician (técnico superior) in the Department of Airport Infrastructure and Air Navigation and was then promoted to Assistant to Director in the same department in 1998. He was promoted to Vice President one year afterwards, where he remained until his promotion to President of AACM on 31 March 2006. Mr. Chan possesses rich knowledge in aviation. He graduated from the Mississippi State University, Mississippi, U.S.A with the Bachelor of Science in Aerospace Engineering and completed his Master of Science and Technology in Aviation in the University of New South Wales in Australia. He holds the private pilot license (Aeroplanes) and the air traffic controller license (Macau Tower) and has acquired professional training in air transport, air law, flight instrument procedures and so on. Mr. Chan stated that aviation is a highly technical and professional world business which must meet international standards and gain international recognition. AACM will continue to guarantee the safe and efficient development of aviation in Macao and conform to their four values: integrity, responsibility, professionalism and team work. Facing the liberalization of the aviation market, AACM expects that the new airlines will come into operation commencing the second half of 2006. By that time, AACM will focus on tasks relating to application for new air operator certificate, application for new routes, registry for new aircraft type and so on. If necessary, AACM may seek the assistance of the International Civil Aviation Organization in the certification work. In terms of aviation policies, the SAR government will continue to adopt very liberal policies to provide better operational environment for the local operators and attract more mainland and foreign airlines to operate to Macao so as to increase the use of the Macau International Airport and boost its status as a regional hub. To achieve this, AACM will continue to negotiate new bilateral air services agreements with countries around the world. In the first quarter of this year, the Authority has already initialed two air services agreements respectively with Greece and Slovakia. With regard to the issue of Macao’s airlines flying through mainland cities to beyond points or mainland airlines flying though Macao to beyond points, the issue of which is of much concern to the industry, AACM has held discussions, in an open manner, with the General Administration of Civil Aviation of China (CAAC) since 2003. Due to the fact that a lot of technical and legal issues are involved, the discussion for a resolution takes time. Despite this, the SAR government has already invited high ranking officials of CAAC to visit Macao this year to discuss the issue. In terms of regional cooperation, to reduce the redundancy in inspection and therefore lower the costs of the operators, AACM will continue to cooperate with CAAC and the Civil Aviation Department of Hong Kong SAR (HKCAD) in mutual acceptance of all maintenance standards and aircraft maintenance engineer licensing. Furthermore, to aim for the safe and smooth operation of air traffic in the Pearl River Delta Region, a working group comprising people from AACM, CAAC and HKCAD has been established to study the issue and a draft plan for the air traffic management and implementation in the Region targeted for the year 2020 has been devised. After the plan has been put into implementation, the capacity of the airports in the Region will be greatly increased and the flight procedures will be improved. In addition to the Secretary for Transport and Public Works, the event was also attended by the consultants of the Cabinet of Secretary Ao Man Long, the directors of his subsidiary government bodies and aviation representatives.