“The Year of the Rooster” begins today at Fiumicino airport, with the celebration of the Chinese New Year, involving passengers, airline staff and airport operators. The event was held at new boarding area E, for Extra-Schengen flights, where 10 artists performed the traditional Lion Dance, while travellers were offered typical Chinese fortune cookies. Taking part in the initiative, organised by ADR, were representatives of the major Chinese airlines - Air China, Cathay Pacific, China Airlines, China Eastern, China Southern and Hainan Airlines – which, along with Alitalia, connect the airport directly with ten major cities in Greater China: Beijing, Xi'an, Chongqing, Haikou, Wuhan, Canton, Shanghai, Wenzhou, Hong Kong and Taipei. A true record that the Rome airport shares only with Paris in Europe.

The development strategy towards eastern destinations, advanced by ADR in recent years, has achieved significant returns in terms of traffic growth. In 2016, 480,000 (+51% vs 2015) passengers travelled on the Rome–China route, or as many as 690,000 (+28% vs 2015), if we include those who travelled to and from Greater China.

Fiumicino is one of the first airports in the world to be credited as a “Welcome Chinese Airport”, recently elevated to GOLD level, issued by the China Tourism Academy.

The services launched as part of this initiative include informational and commercial signage, a Chinese version of the website, the availability of free hot water at the airport eateries and the Shopping Helper service, where there will be female ADR staff providing assistance in Chinese.

A dedicated service that, in December 2016, was further enhanced, with the opening of new Boarding Area E, by a leading food operator specialising in eastern cuisine.

More news for shopping: also dedicated to the Chinese New Year is ADR’ s Damiani promotion which, to celebrate the occasion, is offering an 8% discount on all purchases, with no spending limits, to all passengers travelling to Extra-Schengen (non-EU) destinations, on duty-free prices already discounted by 22%.