Economic Security Documentation System in Civil Aviation Enterprises: The Case of Airports

Abstract

Airports operate as complex socio-technical systems where financial, operational, and safety risks intersect; yet the documentary foundations that translate incidents into measurable economic learning remain weakly integrated and unevenly disclosed.  The aim of the article is to develop and substantiate a conceptual Airport Economic Security Documentation System (AESDS) by specifying essential document types and their interactions across the strategic–tactical–operational hierarchy, and by mapping how publicly disclosed artifacts at EU airports relate to financial stability, fraud prevention, and risk resilience. The methodology is a web-based documentary review - without interviews - covering eight EU operators (Schiphol, Frankfurt/Fraport, Groupe ADP, Vienna/Flughafen Wien, daa/Dublin, ANA-Portugal, Athens, Prague), limited to materials on official websites and investor portals (annual/governance/ESG reports, policies, supplier/partner codes, SMS/operational regulations). Artifacts were recorded if explicit, current, and linked to governance oversight; public visibility was then assessed along the incident → costing → closure chain. Across the sample, board-anchored ERM and ethics/vigilance systems are widely disclosed, while operational documents that evidence economic-impact tracing - standardized incident-to-impact costing forms, revenue-assurance SOPs, and closure KPIs - are rarely public. Governance disclosures (e.g., Schiphol’s COSO-aligned ERM; Vienna’s audit-committee oversight; daa’s ERM-ESG-ethics integration) confirm a robust top-down scaffolding, but the financial translation layer remains opaque online. The public record thus reveals an asymmetric disclosure pattern: high visibility for incident capture (SMS, whistleblowing), moderate for governance closure, and low for costing/impact artifacts - the critical link from events to economic learning. This pattern reflects commercial sensitivity rather than the absence of practice and motivates an AESDS maturity construct grounded in documentary presence, minimum content, ownership/refresh cycles, and evidence-of-use thresholds. A validated AESDS should integrate strategic policies, tactical control designs (risk registers, revenue-assurance, supplier oversight, incident-to-impact procedures), and operational evidence (checklists, scorecards, costing forms, dashboards), with expert consensus used to finalize minimum content and feasible thresholds for airports of different sizes. Such standardization would enhance transparency, risk resilience, and compliance efficiency while enabling rigorous cross-airport evaluation of documentation maturity and its performance payoffs.