An attendant checks luggage compartments to prepare for a China Southern Airlines flight at Haikou Meilan International Airport in Haikou city, South China's Hainan province. [Photo/IC]

The Haikou Meilan International Airport in Haikou, capital of Hainan province, recently won two 2017 Airport Service Quality (ASQ) awards, it was announced by the Airports Council International (ACI) on March 6.

The Haikou airport won as the "2017 World's Best Airport in the 15-25 million passenger throughput scale ASQ" and took second place for the "2017 World's Best Airport (Asia-Pacific Region) ASQ", one step up from its ranking in the Asia-Pacific region last year. 

ACI is the only global trade representative of the world's airports. Established in 1991, it represents airports' interests with governments and international organizations such as the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), and develops standards, policies and recommended practices for airports. It also provides information and training opportunities to raise standards around the world.

ACI's ASQ is a globally famous benchmarking program measuring passengers' satisfaction while they are travelling through an airport. The program provides the research tools and management information to better understand passengers' views and what they want from an airport's products and services. 

More than 300 airports around the world participated in the passenger satisfaction survey and most of the top 100 were included in the appraisal. The ranking was made based on 34 key indexes within eight categories such as traffic to and fro, efficiency of check-in procedures, hardware facilities, food and drinks, and commercial retail.

A Hainan Airlines employee answers passenger queries at a service counter in Haikou, Hainan province. [Photo by Shi Yan/China Daily]

The Haikou Meilan International Airport was formally opened on May 25, 1999 and listed in Hong Kong in November 2002. It has since become a major airport in China. Covering an area of 1,140 hectares, it's rated as Grade 4E with 3,600-m-long and 45-m-wide runways. The parallel taxiways can satisfy the demands of full-weight take-offs and landings by such large airplanes as the Boeing 747-400. Terminals of the Haikou Meilan International Airport cover an area of nearly 150,000 sq m, while the station site occupies an area of 790,000 sq m (including two bases) with 78 parking bays.