The world’s airlines will lose $9 billion (£5.86 billion) in 2009, double the level forecast as recently as March, a key industry body warned today.

Airline losses in the first three months of the year have been much more severe than expected as the economic crisis continues to batter demand, Iata, the global airline trade association, said.

Iata, which represents 230 airlines worldwide, said that global airlines had experienced a “rapidly deteriorating revenue environment”. Although there has been growing signs of a bottoming out of the recession, the Geneva-based association said that 50 major airlines had reported losses of more than $3 billion.

Giovanni Bisignani, director general of Iata, said that there had been growing signs of a bottoming-out of the recession, but any recovery in air traffic ahead faced several “severe headwinds”, including high consumer debt and business inventories.

The Iata forecast of net losses for the airline industry of $9 billion this year is nearly double the $4.7 billion predicted in March and follows estimated net losses of $10.4 billion in 2008.

Many leading carriers, including Air France-KLM and British Airways, are facing a second successive year of losses.

Revenues are now expected to decline by $80 billion, or an unprecedented 15 per cent from a year ago, to $448 billion this year, and the weakness will persist into 2010.

“There is no modern precedent for today’s economic meltdown,” Mr Bisignani said. “The ground has shifted. Our industry has been shaken. This is the most difficult situation that the industry has faced."

Iata also revised its estimated loss for last year to $10.4 billion from $8.5 billion previously.

It said passenger traffic for 2009 is expected to contract by 8 per cent from a year ago to 2.06 billion travellers.

Cargo demand will decline by 17 per cent. The association expects the industry fuel bill to shrink by $59 billion, or 36 per cent, to $106 billion this year, with an average oil price of $56 a barrel. But crude oil prices have rallied in recent weeks, breaching the $70 a barrel level on Friday on hopes of economic recovery.

Mr Bisignani urged governments to avoid protectionist policies and said that restrictions on routes should be lifted.

“It would be a cheap and effective stimulus ... liberalising key routes today would create 24 million jobs and $490 billion in economic activity,” he said.

This year alone, airlines are expected to spend about $25 billion to take delivery of more than 800 Western-built jets, draining cash for a second straight year.

“Aircraft ordered in good times are being delivered in recession,” he said. “Finding customers to fill them profitably will be a challenge.”

Iata said carriers in all regions were expected to report losses, although it expects Japan, China and India to be hardest hit.

Carriers in the Asia Pacific region are expected to report losses of $3.3 billion, worse than the previous forecast of $1.7 billion but better than the $3.9 billion losses last year.

North American carriers are expected to lose $1 billion, far better than its $5.1 billion losses in 2008, thanks to early capacity cuts and limited hedging by U.S. carriers.

Despite strong traffic, Middle East carriers will face losses deepening to $1.5 billion as the region’s intercontinental hubs are vulnerable to recessionary impacts in Europe and Asia.

A collapse for demand in premium services in all major markets will push European airlines into losses of $1.8 billion. Latin American carriers are expected to lose $900 million and African airlines $500 million.

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