China will demand many more aircraft over the coming 20 years than Boeing expected a year ago, according to the manufacturer’s latest forecast. Average annual traffic growth of 8.8% will drive Chinese purchases of 3,400 new aircraft worth $340 billion from 2007 to 2026, Boeing says. Demand forecasts routinely creep up from year to year as the period under review edges further out, but the latest figures from Boeing show a radical revision to its outlook. The unit forecast has risen by 18% from last year and the value forecast by 21%.

Harbin Aircraft will renew its push into the light transport market with an aircraft whose design has advanced the firm’s skill in computational fluid dynamics. Part of a broad initiative to develop a range of Chinese commercial aircraft that meet the standards of Western customers, the Y12F turboprop shows the great leap in efficiency that industry here has been able to achieve since the development of the original Y12 in the early 1980s.

Chinese research and development firm Guangdong Changsheng Aircraft Design Co. has developed preliminary designs for an airliner family in response to government calls for private participation in China's project to build a new large aircraft. The proposed aircraft are based on two conventional basic types: the CS2010 narrowbody, which is similar to the Airbus A320; and the CS2000 wide body, comparable with the Boeing 767.