All world regions, including Africa, have seen a proportional drop in plane losses and fatalities in 2011, Reuters reports. The International Air Transport association has confirmed this, stating that Russia and countries linked to it in the Commonwealth of Independent States is the only exception.

According to the report total fatal accidents up to November 30 were 22, causing the deaths of 486 passengers and crew. Last year's totals were 23 and 786. In 2006, 855 people died in 20 crashes.

Included in IATA's global safety performance calculations are 240 airlines in 118 different countries operating international services. This makes up 84 percent of total global traffic. Low cost airlines are not included in this calculation, as they have their own grouping.

IATA measures its members' safety performance by the number of accidents and aircraft losses per million take-offs.

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