Mission Statement: to assist the integration of foreign residents living in Spain
By Linda Hall •
Published: 10 Nov 2024 • 14:04
• 2 minutes read
Greenland is spending the equivalent of €741 million on improving its airports as it bids to attract more tourists.
The economy of this autonomous region within the Kingdom of Denmark relies on the the public sector and fishing although tourism brought in 1.9 billion Danish kroner (€245.8 million) in 2023, approximately one-tenth of Greenland’s gross domestic product.
Visiting cruise ships account for some of this revenue, but the burgeoning tourist sector wants to make it easier to reach the country by air.
It has done this by extending the runway at Nuuk airport, which means that after November 28 large aircraft from Europe and the US will be able to land in Greenland’s capital for the first time.
No direct flights to Nuuk airport in the past
Work involved blasting and levelling six million cubic metres of rock and installing advanced technology to assist planes when landing in the capital’s infamously bad weather.
Until now, only 35-seater propeller planes have been able to use the Nuuk landing strip. Travellers have either had to land in Iceland or Kangerlussuaq, a remote former US military base in the north of the country, before switching to one of the smaller planes.
A second international airport is due to open in the popular tourist destination of Ilulissat, 563 kilometres north of Nuuk by 2026, followed by new regional airport in Qaqartoq shortly after.
Speaking to the BBC earlier this year, Jens Lauridsen, chief executive at Greenland Airports, pointed out that flights from most European airports take a little over four hours.
Four hours from the East Coast
“From the US, the East Coast is also four hours,” he said. “So we re placed right in the middle and there is very, very big interest from all major carriers in Europe.”
All are aware that establishing a tourist boom like Iceland’s, which has grown over the last 15 years, will take time.
“All of the infrastructure needs to be in place beforehand, and that s not something that will happen in a day,” said Taatsi Fleischer, a spokesman for Arctic Circle Business, which supports business owners in Greenland’s western areas.
The airports’ project was partly funded by Denmark after Chinese investors expressed their interest, explained Javier Arnaut, who heads the Arctic Social Science department at Greenland University.
“There were concerns about whether this type of investments should be in Chinese hands,” he added.
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Originally from the UK, Linda is based in Valenca province and is a reporter for The Euro Weekly News covering local news. Got a news story you want to share?
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