China to buy 2500 aircraft in next four years

BEIJING: With China's aviation industry experiencing high growth it plans to buy around 2,500 aircraft in the next four years, an official said today.

The strength of China's civil aviation fleet will exceed 4,500 by 2015, Li Jiaxiang, the head of the Civil Aviation Administration of China said, while speaking at China Civil Aviation Development Forum.

Considering its rapid growth Li described China's civil aviation as "sunrise industry."

Tony Tyler, director general of the International Air Transport Association, said that global air passengers were expected to increase to 877 million by 2015 around one fourth of the new passengers will come from China, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

China currently transports the seventh-largest number of air passengers in the world, and the fourth-largest number of airborne goods.