KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 20– Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd (MAHB) has set aside RM400 million capital expenditure (Capex) for 2021, slightly higher than the RM320 million allocated last year.

It said a bulk of the Capex would go into critical big-ticket projects such upgrading ageing aerotrains, baggage handling system (BHS), facial recognition, optimising aircraft bays, and adopting Artificial Intelligence (AI) and cooperating in the system.

“Some of the Capex like BHS will come in the second half of the year,” group chief executive officer Datuk Mohd Shukrie Mohd Salleh said at a media briefing entitled “Navigating Unprecedented Crisis and Way Forward (2021-2025)” here, today.

He said the upgrading and rehabilitation of the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) runway 1 is currently at 70 per cent and is expected to be completed by March 2021 while the rehabilitation of runway 2 is slated for 2026.

Meanwhile, he said the prolonged pandemic and reintroduction of the Movement Control Order (MCO) continued to pose challenges with many uncertainties while the opening of borders remained critical for the airport operator.

Hence, he said passengers load factor in 2021 is expected to improve by 60-70 per cent with the deployment of vaccines worldwide.

For the next five years, he said MAHB would focus on survival and recovery to ensure sustainability.

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