The term General Aviation often is misinterpreted in public as well as in media and politics. GA covers a wide range of flying activities, e.g. private transportation, sports and recreational flying, operations used for specialized services such as agriculture, construction, photography, surveying, observation and patrol, search and rescue, aerial development, etc.
In fact, the diversity of GA/AW is so great that ICAO defines general aviation by exception: those flight activities not involving commercial air transport or the military.
In sheer numbers GA/AW is impressive: approximately 350,000 aircraft and 700,000 pilots are involved in these activities worldwide.
The significance of GA/AW becomes greater when it is realized that every airline pilot and military pilot must begin their journey to professional competence in the cockpit of general aviation aircraft.
GA/AW activities globally create and secure hundreds of thousands of jobs and tens of billions of dollars for the countries these activities serve.