Air Macao, the flag-ship air carrier in the special administrative region of China, launched a new route to Changsha city of southern China's Hunan province here on Monday.

The release issued by the airline said the Macao-Changsha route will offer a service of two flights every week on Tuesday and Thursday.

Fei Hongjun, general manager of the airline, told the opening ceremony that the new air flight is hopefully to help boost the tourist flow from the Hunan province to Macao.

Residents of the province from May 1 will be covered in the Individual Tourist Scheme, which permits mainland tourists to travel to Hong Kong and Macao on personal planning.

Macao has opened air links with 12 mainland cities so far, Fei said.

Air Macao, which launched its debut commercial flight in 1995, depends its business mainly on semi-direct flights between the Chinese mainland and Taiwan.

The airline logged record operating revenue of 2.4 billion patacas (US$300 million) in 2005, handling 2.1 million passengers and 150,000 tons of cargo, and serving 18 destinations across Asia.

(Xinhua News Agency April 19, 2006)