A passenger plane of China Southern Airlines stops at berth at Beijing Daxing International Airport in Beijing, capital of China, May 13, 2019. Beijing Daxing International Airport completed its first test flight of passenger planes as four aircraft landed safely on the runway Monday morning. (Xinhua/Cai Yang)

China Southern Airlines will keep code-share partnerships with most SkyTeam members after its official departure from the airline alliance on January 1, the airline said on Tuesday.

A code-share agreement is an arrangement where two or more airlines share the same flight. A seat can be purchased from an airline on a flight that is actually operated by another airline under a different flight number or code. All major airlines have one or more code-share agreements.

China Southern will continue code-share partnerships with 14 existing SkyTeam partners including Aeroflot, Air France, Delta Air Lines, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, Korean Air and Xiamen Airlines, it said in a statement to the Hong Kong stock exchange.

Frequent flyer cooperation will also be continued with these SkyTeam partners, it said, adding the airline would launch its own priority service brand to substitute "Skypriority" on its flights.

However, China Southern will not continue its code-share partnership with China Eastern Airlines Corp, another SkyTeam member.

Reuters - Global Times