Government Open to Considering Commercial Wing at Ämari Air Base
The Ministry of Economic Affairs is seeking partners for expanding Estonia's air cargo market, with the possibility of opening Ämari Air Base for commercial operations.
Eesti Päevaleht reported that it has obtained a confidential analysis of the base's potential business prospects. It was commissioned in 2011 by Trigon Capital, whose CEO Joakim Helenius is the former supervisory board chairman of Estonian Air and a major donator to IRL, the national conservative coalition partner. Trigon had suggested that Ämari could be turned into an important cargo center for Northern Europe, with routes to Scandinavia and St. Petersburg.
But Trigon was not able to find investors and the proposal has been shelved, with officials saying that Tallinn Airport still has plenty of capacity to support new shippers.
Yet the Ministry of Economic Affairs is currently working to find new partners for an Estonian cargo center, advertising specifically to Chinese and Japanese companies, and officials say the Ämari option is still on the table for the future.
If Ämari is turned into a dual-purpose facility, one of the obstacles would be arranging an agreement with the air force so that military and commercial activities don't interfere with each other. Military officials hope that in a few years NATO fighters taking part in the Baltic airspace policing mission will be based out of Ämari for four months out of the year. So far, they have been headquartered solely in Lithuania.