The National Flag Carrier Loses Out 80% Of Its Business Share To The Competition!

BREAKING NEWS!!!

The venerable Kuensel has finally found its voice - after suffering mumps for the past 60 years.

I am hugely encouraged! The following report by the Kuensel on the self-defeating foolishness of the DrukAir Corporation may be proof that the Kuensel is finally maturing into a responsible media house:

It is sad – and no less intriguing - that the Royal Government of Bhutan can continue to tolerate stupidity at this scale – in allowing the DrukAir to price themselves out of the market. Imagine, what commercial entity allows 80% of its market share to be usurped by other competing airlines operating from outside their domain? And to think that they have the commanding position of being the country’s national flag carrier with advantages that third country competitors do not have.

The country is ill-equipped to counter the long-term implications of DrukAir’s irresponsible behavior. The consequences of what they are doing goes far, far beyond loss of their business turnover; beyond the devastation they have already caused to the country’s vital tourism industry.

According to the Kuensel article, the DrukAir offers the reason that they are operating under conditions that are out of the normal. In other words, what they are saying is that they are justified in imperiling the lives and livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of Bhutanese people, as a consequence. That is a pathetic justification!

The benefit of tourism cuts across the entire spectrum of Bhutanese society. Some two years back, upon being invited to give a talk to the DeSuups who were being trained to be guides at the Phaduna Skilling Centre in Punakha, the following was one of the 33 PowerPoint slides I presented to the trainees:

ABTO puts the figure of licensed Tour Operators in the country at roughly 800. Sadly, a sizeable number of them have been driven to migrate to Australia and the US, in search of livelihood – one more is due to depart for Australia on coming Tuesday. The GAB puts the number of Licensed Tourism Guides at about 4,700. An official at the GAB tells me that today less than 700 of them have some semblance of employment.

If the superintendents and the management of the DrukAir has any conscience at all, they should know that they have played a major role in contributing to the bleak situation that is currently prevailing in the country’s tourism industry, in addition to the fact that their incompetence has resulted in rank outsiders to siphon away 80% of the market share that should have been rightfully theirs.

When it is clear that they are incapable of understanding the harm they are causing themselves ... it would be futile to expect that they would understand the consequences of their irresponsibility on the nation and the people of Bhutan.