Globally, there are four key sources of safety information in use. The most dominant private sector safety rating is provided by IATA, related to individual airlines. IATA provides audits of individual airlines with its IATA International Safety Audit (IOSA) program. Originally designed to eliminate duplicating audits that airlines must complete before joining alliances, this program is now mandatory for all IATA members. But, the audit has grown so much in visibility that even non-IATA members subject themselves to it in order to obtain the credibility of its certification.
Two other audit programs, both targeted toward countries, rather than airlines, are the U.S. FAA’s International Aviation Safety Assessment (IASA) audit, and ICAO’s Universal Safety Oversight Program (USAOP).
The FAA’s IASA program applies to countries with direct flights into the United States. A country with a rating of category I is considered to have a high enough standard in oversight to allow direct flights, while a category II country is not allowed in any way to increase existing capacity (though if flights already exist, they may perhaps continue). 106 countries currently have IASA audits, of which 17 have received the category II rating. Of those 17, six are African countries, of a total of 10 African countries having gone through the audit (table 3.2 ).
Table 3.2 Current assignment of FAA categories regarding safety for African countries
|
Country
|
Category
(1 = pass, 2 = fail)
|
Cape Verde
|
1
|
Côte d’Ivoire
|
2
|
Congo, Dem. Rep. of
|
2
|
Egypt
|
1
|
Ethiopia
|
1
|
Gambia
|
2
|
Ghana
|
2
|
South Africa
|
1
|
Swaziland
|
2
|
Zimbabwe
|
2
|
Source: FAA
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| ICAO’s USOAP audit theoretically (and by law) runs in three-year cycles, though often there are longer gaps, measuring a country against standards set in the ICAO annexes and SARPS. As figure 3.3 shows, Africa overall lacks a high amount of safety implementation. The chart measures the number of discrepancies from the established norms in safety according to specific technical criteria. If one were to take the inverse of the percentages shown, one would obtain the level of implementation of the safety standards, i.e. a ranking of above 60% in “Continiued Surveillance Obligations” would indicate that the region is less than 40% compliant in implementation of it surveillance. Acceptable limits are at least 75% - 80% in implementation, i.e. Africa’s safety oversight overall would not be up to standard until the lack of effective implementation falls in the 20 – 30% band. The audit program’s findings as seen in the chart has high reliability in pointing toward weaknesses in safety oversight as measured by accidents - . Figure 3.4 compares audit findings with actual accidents rates, again with west and central Africa, to the right of the chart, having the highest values in audit deficiencies along with the highst actual accident rates.
Figure 3.3 Lack of effective implementation of critical elements in oversight as measured by ICAOS’s USOAP audits. This chart is from 2004. The top line applies to West and Central Africa, the second to top line to East and southern Africa. Implementation of oversight standards is lacking significantly on all levels as compared the rest of the world. North Africa is not included in this chart.
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Source: ICAO.
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Figure 3.4 Accuracy of the audit findings in relationship to actual accident rates, with the related regions. This figure shows a strong relationship between the findings and actual accidents, with Sub-Saharan Africa being the most worrisome globally.
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Source: ICAO.
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Table 3.3 African countries currently on the EU blacklist
|
Country
|
Airlines
|
Sudan
|
1
|
Rwanda
|
1
|
Angola
|
1
|
Congo, Dem. Rep. of
|
All, with specific mention of 51
|
Equatorial Guinea
|
All, with specific mention of 7
|
Liberia
|
All
|
Sierra Leone
|
All, with specific mention of 8
|
Swaziland
|
All, with specific mention of 6
|
Source: European Union.
Note: Other countries found on the blacklist are North Korea, Afghanistan, Iran, Ukraine, Indonesia, and the Kyrgyz Republic.
| The fourth program relies on measures such as safety ramp checks for aircraft flying into Europe, and is the well-known European Union (EU) Blacklist. The program was chosen as an extreme measure as more and more safety related events and crashes forced the EU to take enforcement into their own hands by simply not letting specific carriers into the Union. The program is somewhat more ambiguous since it targets both airlines and their country of origin, and has created exceptions for certain airplanes in otherwise banned airlines where, for example, maintenance is being performed exclusively in Europe. The list, as of June 18, 2008, is summarized in table 3.3.
Box 3.2 Example in West and Central Africa: Nigeria and safety oversight
With more than 5 million passengers yearly, Nigeria aviation market is second only to South Africa in Sub Saharan Africa. Following the demise of Nigeria Airways, the country experienced a significant increase in the number of its registered commercial carriers up to a peak of more than 40 in 2005. Unfortunately, this rapid increase in the number of operators was not followed by a parallel improvement of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority’s (NCAA) capacity to regulate efficiently their safety and security standards. The consequence of this disconnect became painfully visible following three fatal domestic flight crashes in 2005 and 2006 which cost the lives of more than 300 passengers. In each case, pilot error linked to inadequate NCAA’s oversight was partially to blame.
Since then, the Nigerian Government has taken a number of measures to strengthen NCAA’s oversight over air transport operators and tighten operators’ technical requirements. These are:
NCAA’s overall financial and administrative autonomy has been comforted following an amendment of the Civil Aviation Act in late 2006 which makes the 5 year appointment of NCAA’s Director General a parliamentary act;
Minimum capital required for domestic and international airlines has been increased, respectively, by 25 and 100 times in order to weed out undercapitalized airlines. At the end of 2008, the number of commercial operators had dropped to less than 15 versus more than 40 in 2006; and
NCAA has started through Government and Donors’ funding to implement a massive retraining program for its technical oversight personnel; and
An institutional and operational review of NCAA’s modus operandi has been launched.
In spite of the progresses made, Nigerian aviation sector still faces major challenges, the most important of which are:
Long term sustainability of NCAA’s technical oversight capacity – with more than 90% of its annual revenues absorbs by more than 650 staff, NCAA cannot generate enough revenues from users’ fees to finance its long term training and equipment needs. Unless its recurring costs are lowered, its future oversight capacity will continue to rely on erratic Government budgetary support; and
NCAA is still struggling to enforce quality safety and security standards on Federal agencies operating the airport and airspace systems in Nigeria.
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