On the relationship between air connectivity and economic development: A comparative analysis of inequality evolution for 2000–2019

Throughout the past decades, aviation has experienced a tremendous growth of passenger and cargo demand. This growth may come with problems however, when considering the Sustainable Development Goals set by the United Nations in 2015, particularly those related to the sustainable and fair use of resources and reduction of inequalities among countries. This study discusses the air connectivity inequalities of countries from various perspectives, covering topology-based and schedule-based connectivity indicators. We focus on the connectivity changes of countries between the years 2000 and 2019, i.e., before the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Results indicate that our aviation system is dominated by a few highly-developed countries in Western Europe and Northern America. While this dominance is gradually weakened, mainly due to the emergence of aviation hubs in the Middle East and the role of China as a hub in Asia, there need to be more efforts towards a homogeneous aviation infrastructure. Moreover, the flight connectivity between countries appears to be correlated to the Human Development Index growth value, but not significantly correlated with the potential travel demand between countries. Finally, detailed analysis on network-induced inequalities of connectivity reveal that countries are most unequally distributed concerning betweenness centrality but most equally according to closeness centrality. We believe that our study contributes towards a better understanding of sustainable aviation planning and raises important policy issues concerning the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals.