After a rocky 2024, the global aviation industry’s supply chain headwinds are expected to continue in the year ahead. In a new report, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) predicted severe supply chain issues will continue to impact airline performance next year. These issues will have the combined effect of raising costs and limiting growth.
“Supply chain issues are frustrating every airline with a triple whammy on revenues, costs, and environmental performance. Load factors are at record highs and there is no doubt that if we had more aircraft they could be profitably deployed, so our revenues are being compromised. Meanwhile, the aging fleet that airlines are using has higher maintenance costs, burns more fuel, and takes more capital to keep it flying. And, on top of this, leasing rates have risen more than interest rates as competition among airlines intensified the scramble to find every way possible to expand capacity,” said Willie Walsh, IATA’s Director General.
Challenges growing in scale
IATA’s industry outlook report quantifies the scale of the supply chain challenges facing the airline industry.
The average age of the global fleet has risen to a record 14.8 years. This represents a significant increase from the 13.6 years average for the period 1990-2024. Aircraft deliveries have fallen sharply from the peak of 1,813 aircraft in 2018. The estimate for 2024 deliveries is 1,254 aircraft, a 30% shortfall on what was predicted going into the year. In 2025, deliveries are forecast to rise to 1,802. This is well below earlier expectations for 2,293 deliveries with further downward revisions in 2025 widely seen as quite possible.
The backlog (cumulative number of unfulfilled orders) for new aircraft has reached 17,000 planes, a record high. At present delivery rates, this would take 14 years to fulfil, double the six-year average backlog for the 2013-2019 period. However, the waiting time is expected to shorten as delivery rates increase.
The number of “parked” aircraft is 14% (approximately 5,000 aircraft) of the total fleet (35,166 as at December 2024, including Russian-built aircraft). While this has improved recently, parked aircraft remain 4 percentage points higher than pre-pandemic levels (equivalent to some 1,600 aircraft). Of these, 700 (2% of the global fleet) are parked for engine inspections.
The IATA’s report adds that they expect this situation to persist into 2025. “This is a time when airlines need to be fixing their battered post-pandemic balance sheets,” added Walsh. “But progress is effectively capped by supply chain issues that manufacturers need to resolve.”
Knock-on problems
In particular, the IATA report identified two knock-on negative effects resulting from the industry’s supply chain issues.
First, fuel efficiency (excluding the impact of load factors) was unchanged between 2023 and 2024 at 0.23 litres/100 available tonne kilometers (ATK). This represents a step back from the long-term (1990-2019) trend of annual fuel efficiency improvements in the range of 1.5-2.0%.
Secondly, the industry expects to see exceptional demand for leased aircraft. This demand will push leasing rates for narrow body aircraft to levels 20-30% higher than in 2019.
“The entire aviation sector is united in its commitment to achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2050. But when it comes to the practicality of actually getting there, airlines are left bearing the biggest burden. The supply chain issues are a case in point. Manufacturers are letting down their airline customers and that is having a direct impact of slowing down airlines’ efforts to limit their carbon emissions. If the aircraft and engine manufacturers could sort out their issues and keep their promises, we’d have a more fuel-efficient fleet in the air,” said Walsh.
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