The Union of West and Central African airport managers (UGAACO) has hosted its first ever Salon Mondial des Infrastructures Equipment et Services Aeroportuaires (SMIESA) at this year’s Aviation Africa, which took place from 12-13 September at the Kigali Convention Centre (KCC) in Rwanda.
SMIESA’s aim of brining together stakeholders from across Africa’s airport community to network, share insights and devise strategies on how the industry can accelerate its recovery, promote sustainability and enhance the customer experience.
The two-day events saw a busy conference agenda with topics covering Africa’s aim of becoming a major player in aviation globally, the promotion and development of seamless collaboration and innovative technologies, the advancement of single African skies under the SAATM agreement and raising awareness of aviation activities in Rwanda’s.
Daniel Lefebvre, UGAACO president and general manager for AERCO, which operates three airports in the Republic of Congo, opened the SMIESA summit urging stakeholders within Africa’s aviation community “to welcome sector-specific events as they are a must for the future development of the country’s airport sector.”
He also highlighted Rwanda’s role as a leader in Africa’s aviation sector and underlined the need for African countries to take charge of manufacturing and promoting airport products and services across the continent.
Sustainability was a key topic at the conference, as was the need to embrace the digitalisation of the sector and funding and business models for airports.
With the inaugural SMIESA co-located with the sixth Aviation Africa summit, the event was deemed a huge success. “For the last two days stakeholders have come together to address the challenges we face in the airport community with one voice,” said Charles Habonimana, Managing Director, Rwanda Airports Company. “I am delighted we have been able to host the first ever SMIESA here in Rwanda and we look forward to building on this event for future summits.”
