Qatar Airways has unveiled plans to launch 17 new destinations by 2017, said a report citing details from the national airline's Annual Report 2016.

Destinations to be launched before March 2017 include Auckland (New Zealand) and Helsinki (Finland) to complement its service to the northern capitals of Europe, Gulf Times reported.

"Qatar Airways remains deeply committed to its growth trajectory and has firm aircraft orders that will enable continued growth whilst at the same time providing fleet renewal keeping our company at the forefront of technology and enabling continuous product innovation," the report cited Qatar Airways Group chief executive Akbar Al-Baker as saying.

The demand for air travel continues to grow across the globe albeit at differing rates in emerging and mature markets.

The largest-growth markets in the near to medium term are expected to be on the African continent and India, whilst South America and China continue to have strong underlying growth.

The introduction of 13 new destinations to the airline's global network during fiscal 2016 further expanded Qatar Airways' route network to more than 150 destinations in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, Asia-Pacific and the Americas.

Significantly, Qatar Airways launched flights to a number of high profile destinations during this period, including daily flights to Los Angeles in the US and Sydney in Australia, further strengthening its overall route network relevancy to travellers world-wide.

"Our connectivity to the UK also increased to 73 weekly flights with the addition of Birmingham, our fourth UK destination," al-Baker said.

The destinations Qatar Airways added during the 2016 fiscal year were; Abha, Amsterdam, Birmingham, Boston, Durban, Faisalabad, Los Angeles, Multan, Nagpur, Ras Al Khaimah, Sialkot, Sydney, and Zanzibar.

In the region, the Doha-Dubai Shuttle was introduced, the first-of-its-kind flying between the two cities.