Air Cargo on the Rise in Asia, Slowly

Asia-Pacific region sees a slow rise in cargo markets

Air cargo markets in the Asia-Pacific region are slowly growing according to the initial traffic figures for the month of July. These figures were recently released by the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines (AAPA). Its member airlines’ cargo volumes grew by 3.9 percent which is measure in freight tonne kilometers (FTKs).

Although there was a 3.4 percent increase in capacity for July, the international freight load factor still rose by just 0.4 percentage points to 62.1 percent.

Andrew Herdman, AAPA’s director general explained: “International air cargo demand has been relatively weak, with year-to-date demand registering a 1.5 percent decline, compared to the same period a year ago, but we have seen a modest pickup in air cargo volumes during the past couple of months,”

He added, “Given the highly competitive market conditions, Asia-Pacific airlines are focusing on carefully managing costs.”

However, in the first 6 months of year, FTKs reported by the carriers remained low, going down 1.5 percent to 36.87 billion, but the available freight tonne kilometers over the same time period were up by 2.4 percent.

Member airline All Nippon Airways (ANA) elected to cut freighter flights between Japan and China due to weakening demand for Japan-produced, high-value auto parts from Chinese manufacturers.

This comes at a time when Shanghai airport’s main cargo terminal operator continued its growth path in the first seven months of 2016, handling 919,461 tonnes of airfreight, a 2% year-on-year increase.

Pudong Int’l Airport Cargo Terminal Co Ltd (PACTL) said that the volume increase was “the strongest result for the first seven months of any year in the company’s history”.