International air travel deeply affected by the world economic downturn is beginning to level out but may not recover for another two years as travellers and business travel continues to cut back, both Boeing and Airbus said yesterday.

Randy Tinseth, a Boeing marketing vice president said passenger travel had faired somewhat better in the second half of 2009, but was still expected to slump between 6 and 8 percent for the year.

Even though the decline in air travel seemed to be slowing, airlines are starting to see higher capacity in the Chinese and Latin American markets.

He told reporters at the an Asian aerospace and aviation show in Hong Kong that some improvement was seen in traffic growth but there was still a long way to go.

Airlines have amounted massive losses since the beginning of the economic crisis which led companies to cut back travel and consumers to cut back on holiday travel.  The airline industry is already estimating losses of around $6 billion in the first half of this year and set to lose a total of $9 billion overall for 2009.

Boeing competitor Airbus has a slightly more positive forecast, saying that air traffic seemed to be bottoming out.

Global air travel is measured by a combination of revenues, passengers and distances flown.  It is predicted that all of these combined could slide between 2 and 4 percent this year, then grow flat or increase by 4 percent next year, an Airbus senior marketing vice president said.

Boeing also predicts that Asia will overtake North America as the world’s largest air travel market in the next 20 years, growing from 32 percent to 41 percent.