Category Archives: Aviation

With an aim to meet the significant increase in demand for cargo services to India, Saudia Cargo is offering 60 tonnes of cargo capacity per week in the bellies of its A330 aircraft flying to Calicut International Airport (CCJ), Kerala. Omar Hariri, Chief Executive Officer, Saudia Cargo, said, “The cargo business is doing its best to support the agricultural products and general cargo of Kerala region, exploring every way possible to increase exports from the neighbouring cities of Calicut.”

Government of Punjab has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with AAI Cargo Logistics and Allied Services (AAICLAS) for operation and maintenance of the cargo terminal at Amritsar airport. As per the MoU, AAI will operate and manage the Centre for Perishable Cargo (CPC) facility at the airport. The facility has been in operation since 2013. The move is designed to boost agricultural exports from Punjab and its neighbouring states with cargo flights expected to begin in the near future. The MoU was exchanged between Sibin C, Managing Director, Punjab Agro Industries and Keku Bomi Gazder, Chief Executive Officer, AAI Cargo Logistics and Allied Services.

After successful operation of passenger services, Kanpur Airport has got theoretical consent from the Airports Authority of India (AAI) to make a cargo terminal at the airport. According to Jameel Khalique, Director, Kanpur Airport, “The goods can be sent up to 10 tonnes from this port. Loading-unloading of goods is expected to start from next financial year.” Under the UDAN scheme, the operation of the Kanpur-Delhi flight started in July this year. After this, the private airlines are providing direct services to Mumbai and Kolkata. A lot of business opportunities will be created after the start of the cargo service in view of tremendous potential in the field of trade and industry. In view of import-export data from Kanpur, it was decided to build a cargo terminal at the Kanpur Airport.

The fourth PHD Air Cargo Summit was held on November 20 in New Delhi. Here, industry experts deliberated on measures that would enable a continued double-digit growth for air cargo. Suresh Prabhu, Union Minister of Commerce & Industry and Civil Aviation, Government of India, declared that new Integrated Logistics and Air Cargo Policy is on anvil. He said, “With this new policy in place, the solutions to critical issues relating to agriculture and manufacturing output and their supplies, including exports, would be sufficiently explored, though the possibilities of making improvement in such an integrated policy still exist even in future.”

GMR Group-led Delhi International Airport (DIAL) has registered one million tonne cargo between November 2017 and October 2018, and also handled the highest-ever monthly air cargo tonnage of 100,091 MT in a single month (October 2018). This has placed IGIA’s cargo handling at the 28th position globally, making it the only Indian airport to be among the top 30. Videh Kumar Jaipuriar, Chief Executive Officer, DIAL, says, “Delhi airport has been recognised as India’s air cargo gateway for its handling capacity, efficient processes, and service standards.”

Jet Airways has entered global record books for the highest uplift of cargo by an Indian carrier in a single flight. The airline uplifted 45 tonnes of cargo on one of its flights on the Mumbai-London sector operated by a B777-300ER aircraft. The record is globally significant as only two other international carriers have previously operated a flight each with a cargo complement of over 40 tonnes on a Boeing777-300 aircraft. The cargo comprised of product mix including perishables (fruits and vegetables), engineering goods, garments, courier, leather goods and consolidation cargo. Pradeep Kumar, Senior Vice President, Jet Airways Cargo, said, “Air cargo is a vital part of the business at Jet Airways and this milestone is testament to our dedicated focus of growing cargo revenues, which has recorded a CAGR of more than 15 per cent in the past three years.”

With an aim to make Delhi a charter hub, Celebi launched its charter-handling product in the capital today. The idea behind the launch is to attract more charter into the city and offer a comprehensive air cargo charter handling facility. Delhi has been identified as the first pilot station to be developed as a transhipment cargo hub by MoCA under National Civil Aviation Policy 2016. “Our project allows charter customers to manage multiple operations through a single point of contact,” said Ramesh Mamidala, CEO, Celebi Delhi Cargo Terminal Management India, while addressing those present at the launch.

The Indian air cargo industry needs to grow at a rate of about 12.9 per cent every year from 2018 to 2027 to achieve National Civil Aviation Policy’s (NCAP 2016) vision of reaching cargo volumes of 10 million tonnes (MT) by 2027, notes a recent ASSOCHAM-Auctus Advisors joint study. The report suggests that international and domestic air freight is projected to grow at an overall Compounded Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 8.2 per cent. “Considering this trend to continue till 2027, projected international and domestic air cargo will be 3.6 MT and 2.1 MT, respectively, resulting in total air cargo traffic of 6.8 MT,” it states. The study also highlights various issues confronting the aviation logistics sector in India. Lack of enabling infrastructure, lack of automated material handling systems, high manual intervention in processes, and inadequate skilled manpower are some of the key areas where Indian air cargo industry lags behind global peers. “There is an urgent need for creating adequate freight carrying capacity within the Indian air network through creation of new cargo terminals and expansion of existing ones,” the report states.

SpiceXpress, the airfreight unit of SpiceJet, has charted an expansion plan that includes increasing its capacity, and taking its services to more destinations within India and overseas. The company aims to eventually service up to 150 destinations in India, Asia and Europe by 2022. SpiceXpress plans to increase its monthly freight carrying capacity from 15,000 tonnes per month to 27,000 tonnes, by the end of 2018. It also plans to further increase its capacity to 90,000 tonnes by the end of 2022 and also plans to add four more freighter aircraft by March 2019. In terms of destinations, the company is looking to take its services to nearly 10 more locations in India and overseas. These include Mumbai, Kolkata and Guwahati in India, and Dubai, Kabul, Dhaka and Singapore. Besides these aircraft, it also offers cargo capacity on SpiceJet’s passenger aircraft fleet. The fleet includes 36 Boeings and 22 Q400s Bombardiers operating across 47 domestic and 7 international locations.

To power the future growth for its end-to-end air cargo and logistics business, IndiGo has partnered with SmartKargo; a cloud-based air cargo management solution. The airline will deploy SmartKargo for its cargo business across all destinations, including domestic and international operations. IndiGo operates on a fleet size of 189 aircraft including 47 new generation A320 NEOs, 127 A320 CEOs and 12 ATRs, across 57 destinations – 48 domestic and nine internationals. Mohan Kash, Managing Director, SmartKargo India, says, “With our unmatched cloud-based technology and out-of-the-box deployment approach, our customers have significant improvements in key performance indicators, in three main areas, i.e. real-time and complete visibility, higher flown and higher yields.” William Boulter, Chief Commercial Officer, IndiGo, said, “IndiGo cargo has ambitious plans to grow its revenues and remain competitive in this fast-growing area. We needed to have a state-of-the-art technology platform that was fast to deploy and easy to use. SmartKargo includes the local as well as international features needed for our business. Especially important for us was to adopt to best practices in the air cargo industry and deploying SmartKargo can bring us closer.”