Airbus plans to open its second production line in Tianjin in northern China to expand its assembly capacity of the A320 airliner family, Airbus announced Thursday.

Guillaume Faury, CEO of Airbus, signed an agreement with Tianjin Free Trade Zone Investment Company and Aviation Industry Corporation of China in order to achieve its goal of producing 75 A320 aircraft per month by 2026.

Airbus maintains four A320 family final assembly sites: Hamburg (Germany), Toulouse (France), Mobile (Alabama) and Tianjin (China). The Tianjin final assembly line (FAL Asia) started operation in 2008 and has assembled more than 600 A320 aircraft.

Airbus expected that in the next 20 years, China’s air traffic will grow by 5.3 percent annually, compared with the world average of 3.6 percent.

The traffic increases will result in demand for 8,420 passenger and freighter aircraft between now and 2041, representing more than 20 percent of the world's total demand for around 39,500 new aircraft in the next 20 years, said Airbus.

“We are honored to continue our long-standing cooperation by supporting China’s civil aviation growth with our leading families of aircraft,” said Faury.

“It underpins the positive recovery momentum and prosperous outlook for the Chinese aviation market and the desire to grow sustainably with Airbus’s latest generation, eco-efficient aircraft.”

By the end of March 2023, the Airbus in-service fleet in China has risen to more than 2,100 aircraft, representing more than 50 percent of the market.