SINGAPORE (BLOOMBERG) – The global aviation industry will take at least two years to recover from the coronavirus pandemic and mass travel to return, Singapore’s Transport Minister Ong Ye Kung said, stressing the importance of developing a widely available and effective vaccine to help countries open their borders.

“When a vaccine is widely available around the world and people gain confidence to travel again and visit other countries, then we will have aviation back on its feet, almost fully,” Mr Ong said an interview with Bloomberg Television. “How long that will that take, I can’t make a guess, I would say minimally a couple of years.”