Omar Chahin urges attention to falling direct US flights

The president of the Dominican Airlines Association (ADLA), Omar Chahin, flagged an issue that touches the entire tourism chain: the reduction in direct flight frequencies between the Dominican Republic and the United States. He put it plainly, as Listín Diario reported, air connectivity is essential for tourism, for trade and for the large Dominican community living on US soil.

Every seat lost on a route to New York, Miami or Boston is not just one fewer passenger in Punta Cana or Santo Domingo. It is a family that does not travel, a tour operator that does not close a package, a hotel that does not fill a room in low season. Connectivity is soft infrastructure, and like all infrastructure, it is looked after before the gap shows. Chahin is not talking about crisis, he is talking about early attention, and on that the airline guild is right.

The read for the industry is direct. What happens on air routes translates into arrivals, occupancy and tax revenue. Watching every frequency that gets cut is defending the engine behind thousands of jobs in provinces like La Altagracia, Puerto Plata and Samaná. The opportunity lies in diversifying routes and strengthening agreements with the airlines that bet on the country.