Thursday, June 14, 2012

Air freight demand out of Asia drops

Sister carriers Cathay Pacific and Dragonair this week revealed that cargo and mail tonnagefell significantly during May. 

The two Hong Kong-based airlines carried 123,403 tonnes of cargo and mail last month, a drop of 10.6% on May 2011. 

The cargo and mail load factor was down by 5.9 percentage points to 62.3%. Capacity, measured in available cargo/mail tonne km, decreased by 7.3%, while cargo and mail tonne km flown dropped by 15.3%. 

So far this year tonnage has declined by 10.7%, against a capacity drop of 4.1%.

Weak demand also resulted in the final demise of Jade Cargo, the troubled Chinese joint-venture carrier established by Shenzhen Airlines, Lufthansa Cargo and German financial institute DEG.

Its fleet of six freighters was grounded in January. All Asia-Pacific carriers have suffered from falling demand by US and European consumers for Asian manufactured goods.

In February, the shareholders – Shenzhen Airlines (51%), Lufthansa Cargo (25%) and  DEG (24%) – attempted a restructuring deal with Shenzhen-based UniTop Group, which failed. 














Source   IFW