European Aeronautic Defense & Space said Tuesday that its Airbus division, the world’s biggest maker of commercial aircraft, may lose some plane orders next year as the financial crisis continues.

Airbus has not yet reported cancellations stemming from credit-market turmoil, “but I am sure that we will see more consequences next year,” the EADS chief executive Louis Gallois said at a press briefing in London. The order backlog remains “very strong,” and is overbooked for 2010 and 2011, providing a “buffer’ against any scrapped contracts.

Toulouse, France-based Airbus won orders for 756 airliners in the first 11 months of this year, two-thirds of the intake for the year-earlier period, as the global recession crimps demand for air travel. China’s aviation regulator said it would encourage airlines to cancel or postpone plane deliveries due next year.

Worldwide airline traffic may fall by 3 percent next year as economies contract, the industry’s first decline since 2001, the International Air Transport Association said. At the same time, carriers’ combined losses may narrow by half in 2009, to $2.5 billion, as oil prices ease and U.S. airlines are helped by earlier reorganizations, the trade group said.

The U.S. economy has been in recession since December 2007, while the European Central Bank predicts the economy of the 15 countries using the euro will shrink by 0.9 percent in 2009.

The Airbus chief operating officer John Leahy, the plane maker’s top salesman, said in early December that outside financing for aircraft may become more available in mid-2009 as banks that lost money on property come to favor assets that can be easily moved to where demand is strongest. Airbus can provide some funding to customers, though Leahy said the amount would be “as little as possible” because “we’re not a bank.”

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