A Leading UK travel flights comparison site, Cheapflights.co.uk. is dispelling myths about global flying. The award-winning website is tackling
the 'eco- fundamentalist' movement head-on with its ten top reasons to keep flying campaign.
The quick ten reasons are:
Fact One: Air passenger duty (APD - remember that chunky tax added to your ticket price?) already raises £1 billion in revenue annually which, if the
government actually used it for this purpose, is more than enough to offset the UK's entire aviation emissions.
Fact Two: The economies of 40 per cent of the world's countries, including some of the very poorest, depend significantly on tourism.
Fact three: Many poorer countries rely on air freight for income (eg Kenya's fresh vegetables and cut flowers industries are its second biggest source of
foreign exchange).
Fact four: 800,000 people in the UK are directly or indirectly employed in the aviation industry.
Fact five: Flying is on the increase but planes are getting cleaner. New types are available that burn significantly less fuel and release fewer
emissions per passenger e.g. Boeing's 787 Dreamliner uses 20 per cent less fuel.
Fact six: You could stop ALL flying today and you would only cut global emissions by three per cent.
Fact seven: Buildings account for 45 per cent of greenhouse gases: using energy-saving light bulbs, turning appliances off standby and insulating
your house, and the like will make a far greater impact than reducing flights.
Fact eight: Airports use less land than other forms of transport e.g Rail uses seven times more land per passenger mile travelled than aviation.
Fact nine: 80 per cent of aviation¹s carbon emissions arise from long-haul flights where there is no other realistic alternative way to travel.
Fact ten: Flying is something which EVERYONE can now enjoy. Half of all people in the United Kingdom in 'routine or semi-routine' jobs fly up to
three times a year.

Cheapflights chief executive David Soskin says: "In the light of the Stern
Report and talk of more taxation on aviation, we felt it was time to bite
back with some balanced facts. The environment is a very serious issue but
the aviation industry must not be made into a scapegoat