China said  on Jan. 26, it plans to build 97 new airports by 2020, a move that will cater to soaring air travel demand and alleviate the strain on existing aviation infrastructure.

The 450 billion yuan (US$62 billion) undertaking over the next 12 years will bring the total number of civilian airports in China to 244, up from 147 in 2006, according to China's General Administration of Civil Aviation.
 
It announced the plan in a statement on its website but did not specify if the airports are domestic or international.
 
The new airports will be built in five main regions of the country - north, east, south-central, south-western and north-western.
 
When the expansion is complete, it would mean that 82 per cent of China's population - expected to hit 1.45 billion people by 2020 - would be living within 100km - or a 90-minute drive - of an airport.
 
Currently, about 60 per cent of the country's 1.3 billion people live within this range.
 
China's blistering pace of economic growth over the past decade is seeing a surge in demand for air travel, as more and more well-off Chinese criss-cross the country for business as well as for pleasure.
 
And as previously undeveloped provinces and regions open up more to investment and tourism, the country's domestic air travel market has grown by double digits annually.
 
The General Administration predicts passenger traffic will increase by 11.4 per cent a year between now and 2020. Freight traffic will rise by 14 per cent annually.
 
Last year, for example, air traffic volume rose 16 per cent over the previous year to 185 million passengers, according to official figures.
 
Domestic airlines are busy expanding their fleets to meet rising air traffic demand.
 
The increasing demand for air travel has resulted in immense pressure on several key airports in China. The Beijing Capital airport and Shanghai's two airports, Pudong and Hongqiao, are bursting at their seams.
 
The new airport additions will ease some of that pressure. By 2020, the number of airports serving more than 30 million passengers a year will rise from the present three to 13, said the General Administration.
 
The construction of airport facilities, however, will go to waste if the country does not solve certain pressing problems that have been plaguing its aviation industry.
 
A shortage of pilots and limited airspace for civilian flights (China's military controls 70 per cent to 80 per cent of the country's airspace), for example, threaten to slow things down. The gap between the demand and supply of pilots is likely to be 2,000 by 2010, according to state media.
 
But building more airports will also mean more opportunities for foreign investors hoping for a bite of China's aviation infrastructure sector.
 
The country opened up this lucrative market to foreign investors in the early 2000s and overseas airport operators have dived in to buy stakes in several domestic airports.
 
For instance, last year, Singapore's Changi Airports International, an international airport investor, operator and joint venture partner, paid 1.08 billion yuan for a 29-per cent stake in Nanjing Lukou International Airport in east China's Jiangsu province.
 
The venture was described as the first private-equity investment deal in a Chinese airport by a foreign airport.