Category Archives: International

Confirming the airline’s capabilities for safeguarding the integrity of time and temperature-sensitive pharmaceutical products from point of origin to destination, Oman Air has been certified IATA Center of Excellence for Independent Validators for Pharmaceutical Logistics (CEIV Pharma). In successfully obtaining the industry-wide standard, the airline now aims to grow its participation as an important carrier for the global bio-pharma industry. Abdulaziz Al Raisi, CEO, Oman Air, comments, “The certification underpins our capabilities as a global cargo carrier for the quality handling of time and temperature-sensitive healthcare products. This is especially significant during the current COVID crisis, a time when the integrity of vital medications, including vaccines, relies entirely on safe and dependable cold chain expertise both in the air and on the ground. To do so, our customers can benefit from our state-of-the-art facilities at the Muscat International Air Cargo Hub.” Driven by the global biopharma industry, IATA’s CEIV Pharma program encompasses and, often times, supersedes many of the existing standards and guidelines including European Good Distribution Practice, World Health Organization (Annex 5) and United States Pharmacopeia Standards. Obtaining certification demands a high level of commitment from airlines along with exacting standards for pharmaceuticals handling. Oman Air successfully completed a thorough analysis of its business processes and product quality environments, and underwent rigorous evaluation of its pharmaceutical quality management systems, process standards and document review, risk assessments and several internal audits.

Turkish Cargo has delivered 1.7 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine supplied by UNICEF from India to Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo, in cooperation with global shipping company Kuehne + Nagel. Apart from the vaccines, the carrier has successfully delivered hundreds of thousands of Covid-19 syringes belonging to UNICEF from Barcelona to Tunisia and Covid-19 vaccines from Amsterdam to Kiev, Tbilisi and Amman. In the past months, Turkish Cargo has delivered China’s Sinovac vaccines to different destinations in the world. The carrier uses its ‘TK Pharma’ product to transport medicines and vaccines to all over the world. Creating a global pharmaceutical corridor among more than 400 destinations in the world, Turkish Cargo reaches more than 300 destinations, 96 of which are direct cargo destinations. With the widest flight network in the world, Turkish Cargo takes an important responsibility in delivering Covid-19 vaccines to the whole world, and continues to cooperate with national and international authorities within the range of struggling the global pandemic.

Adani Ports and Special Economic Zones (APSEZ) has received a Letter of Intent (LOI) from the Ministry of Ports and Shipping of Sri Lanka and the Sri Lanka Ports Authority, acting on behalf of the Government of Sri Lanka, pursuant to approval from the Sri Lankan Cabinet of Ministers for the development and operations of West Container Terminal (WCT) in Colombo, Sri Lanka. APSEZ will partner with John Keells Holdings PLC, Sri Lanka’s largest diversified conglomerate, and with the Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) as a part of the consortium awarded this mandate. The WCT will be developed on a Build, Operate and Transfer basis for a period of 35 years as a public-private partnership. WCT will have a quay length of 1400 meters and alongside depth of 20 meters, thereby making it a prime transhipment cargo destination to handle Ultra Large Container Carriers. The project is expected to boost WCT’s container handling capacity and further consolidate Sri Lanka’s locational advantage as one of the world’s top strategic nodes along the busiest global transhipment route. The Colombo Port is already the most preferred regional hub for transhipment of Indian containers and mainline ship operators with 45 per cent of Colombo’s transhipment volumes either originating from or destined to an Adani port terminal in India. The network impact of this partnership is significant and expected to be mutually benefitted from the string of 7 container terminals across its 12 ports that Adani operates along the Indian coastline handling an annual volume of over 6 million TEUs. This partnership will multiply and accelerate the transhipment options that will become available to serve various shipping lines and other potential port customers across the …

The CMA CGM Group has chosen ECS Group as its exclusive GSA to help support the expansion of its new air division, CMA CGM Air Cargo, in the air cargo industry. CMA CGM Air Cargo has operated its first full-freight flight on March 13 between Liège and Chicago. By combining their expertise, the two specialists’ aim is to connect Europe to international markets – starting with the United States. With four Airbus A330-200F aircraft, the CMA CGM Group chose Liège (LGG), a dynamic intermodal freight hub, as the location for its European base, and will begin by operating flights to Chicago O’Hare (ORD) in the USA. This is the first stage of the roll-out of this business strategy, which is designed to offer clients broad global coverage. There are also plans to launch new destinations in the United States, which will be announced shortly. As part of CMA CGM AIR CARGO’s worldwide roll-out, the CMA CGM Group is working with ECS Group via a global cargo capacity marketing partnership. The leading GSA is determined to champion this strategy and has already set up dedicated teams in Europe and the United States. Adrien Thominet, CEO, ECS Group said, “ECS Group is extremely honoured to support this strategic move by CMA CGM, a group that is already an expert in chartering and logistics. Our flexibility, our sales network and our business know-how all mean we can amplify the added value the airline is looking for.” This means that the ECS sales teams are hard at work to market capacity on the Group’s new partner’s flights to all freight forwarders. And to do just that, they have all the business intelligence, revenue optimisation …

In order to streamline processes for the transportation of Dangerous Goods (DGs), Emirates SkyCargo and the Dubai Civil Aviation Authority have signed an MoU. Under the terms of the agreement, the two entities will work together to strengthen mechanisms to proactively share information on certain classes of DG booked for transport on Emirates SkyCargo through Dubai. This will complement the information that is already provided as part of the Dangerous Goods Declaration submitted to the DCAA as part of the approvals process for the transportation of goods classified as DG in accordance with IATA Dangerous Goods Regulations. The MoU also aims to develop an approval process for transporting such cargo, creating better efficiency and reducing wait-times pre transportation. The MoU was signed by Mohammed Abdulla Lengawi, Executive Director, Aviation Security and Accidents Investigation Sector, Dubai Civil Aviation Authority and Budoor Al Maazmi, Emirates Cargo Government Business Development Manager in the presence of Nabil Sultan, Emirates Divisional Senior Vice President, Cargo. Nabil Sultan, Emirates Divisional Senior Vice President, Cargo, said, “Safety is one of the key operational pillars for Emirates and through this agreement we will work closely with the authorities to ensure that our DG operations are efficient and comply with all safety requirements.” Mohammed Abdulla Lengawi, Executive Director, Aviation Security and Accident Investigation Sector, DCAA, said, “We are pleased to cooperate with Emirates SkyCargo through the signing of the MOU which will link the Dubai Civil Aviation Authority system with that of Emirates SkyCargo and contribute to streamline processes for transport of Dangerous Goods making it easier for customers including air freight agents to obtain a No Objection Certificate (NOC) for transporting the goods. We have issued over 26,090 …

As part of the multimodal cargo transportation project, SpiceJet has operated its first flight, carrying 48 tonnes of cargo including garments from Dhaka to Spain for a global fashion brand, while availing an inter-connect of two modes of transport through road and air. In this multimodal transportation of the cargo, the consignment was shipped first from Dhaka through Petrapole to Kolkata airport via road and then to New Delhi on a SpiceXpress freighter. From New Delhi, a SpiceXpress Airbus A340 cargo plane was then transported the consignment to Spain. Petrapole is the Indian side of Petrapole-Benapole border checkpoint between India and Benapole of Bangladesh. The initiative will provide an impetus to the Indian government’s vision of making India a transhipment hub. Multimodal transport is a combination of different means of transport to facilitate the movement of cargo, making it faster and more efficient whereby more than one transport mode is involved to ferry the goods to their final destination which may include trucks, trains, ships and airplanes. The initiative was undertaken in association with the Ministry of Civil Aviation and Airports Authority of India”s logistics arm AAICLAS. Ajay Singh, Chairman and Managing Director, SpiceJet said, “We are proud to launch our first-ever multimodal cargo movement between Dhaka and Spain via Kolkata and New Delhi with the help of the civil aviation ministry and AAICLAS.” Multimodal cargo service will actively and effectively contribute in streamlining cargo shipment across various domestic and international sectors, reduce cost and ensure self-reliance, helping realise Prime Minister Narendra Modi”s vision of an Atmanirbhar Bharat, he added.

Ethiopian Airlines has operated COVID-19 vaccine delivery flights from Mumbai to Addis Ababa and from Beijing to Brazzaville. The airline transported the first batch of coronavirus vaccines from Mumbai to Addis Ababa on March 6, 2021 and from Beijing to Brazzaville via Addis Ababa on March 10, 2021, continuing to play its prominent role in the vaccine distribution. Commenting on the operation of the vaccine delivery flights, Tewolde GebreMariam, CEO of Ethiopian Airlines remarked, “We are glad that we have launched the delivery of our mission-critical service with the distribution of much-anticipated COVID-19 vaccine. We will be repeating the remarkable and globally recognised success in leading the fast delivery of PPE few months ago with similar delivery speed, professional handling and maintaining the cool chain during the global vaccine distribution. We have made enough preparations to transport the vaccines across the world.” Ethiopian Cargo & Logistics Services, the cargo unit of Ethiopian Airlines Group, was instrumental in facilitating the flow of medical supplies including PPE across the globe in support of the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic by deploying its state-of-the-art cargo terminal, which is the largest in Africa with annual capacity of around one million tonnes and compartmentalised temperature controlled cold storage facilities. Equipped with different climate chambers ranging between -23OC to 25OC covering an area of 54,000m2, dedicated cool dollies, dedicated pharma team, lease/handling of Envirotainer & DoKaSCH-TS active containers, real-time temperature monitoring system and fully temperature controlled operation, the Pharma Wing is best suited for handling of pharmaceuticals and all types medical supplies. Additionally, leveraging the naturally air-conditioned weather of its home base Addis Ababa, Ethiopian guarantees safe and seamless cool chain logistics for handling temperature sensitive …

Titan Aircraft Investments, the joint venture between Titan Aviation Holdings and Bain Capital Credit, has announced the acquisition of two 767-300ER aircraft from Icelandair. The aircraft will be converted into freighters and leased back to the airline. Bogi Nils Bogason, President and Chief Executive, Icelandair Group, said, “With continued positive outlook for cargo operations post Covid, I am confident that the B767-300ER freighters will allow us to maximise new opportunities in our markets. These aircraft carry around 50 per cent more freight than our current two B757-200 freighters and fit very well into our current fleet and network. Our aim is to increase the capacity in our markets, as well as strengthen Iceland as a hub for cargo, in a similar way as our passenger hub that provides attractive connections between continents.” Michael Steen, President & Chief Executive, TAH, said, “We are delighted to welcome Icelandair as a strategic customer and to support their long-term expansion plans. The 767-300ER is a very attractive medium-sized freighter and we are excited to manage these two aircraft on behalf of the joint venture. We currently own 21 767-300ER freighters, which provide us with extensive experience in this aircraft type.” With the addition of these two B767s, TAI’s portfolio has grown to three aircraft, which also includes a 777-200 freighter.

In February 2021, cargo throughput (airfreight + airmail) at Frankfurt Airport (FRA) rose by 21.7 per cent to 180,725 metric tonnes in the reporting month – despite the ongoing shortage of belly capacity normally provided by passenger aircraft. Due to this robust growth, Frankfurt Airport recorded its highest February cargo month ever. Aircraft movements decreased by 69.0 per cent to 11,122 take-offs and landings, while accumulated maximum take-off weights (MTOWs) contracted by 56.7 per cent to 961,684 metric tonnes year-on-year. The airports in Fraport’s international portfolio continued to report mixed results for February 2021, with traffic performance depending largely on the pandemic situation in the respective region. All of Fraport’s Group airports worldwide – except Xi’an in China – recorded traffic declines compared to February 2020.

Bolloré Transport & Logistics Côte d’Ivoire successfully completed the runway pick-up, customs clearance and delivery of over 500,000 vaccine doses and syringes, as part of the Covid-19 vaccination campaign in Côte d’Ivoire, on 26 February 2021. Mandated by UNICEF, the Bolloré Transport & Logistics teams rolled out logistics solutions right from the landing of the plane at the international airport of Abidjan. The 28 parcels of AstraZeneca vaccines, weighing 1.8 tons, and the 25 parcels of syringes, weighing 3.8 tons, were then transported and delivered to the customer in full respect of the cold chain. In addition, the company has donated a mobile dispensary for tests as well as equipment to supplement the capacities of the National Public Health Institute and Institut Pasteur. The company has also distributed gel, masks and provisions to the population. “Thanks to our 1,500 Ivorian employees, we are pleased to have contributed to the provision of the first Covid-19 vaccines to our populations. We are working hand in hand with the Côte d’Ivoire authorities and UNICEF to support health-promoting operations in the country through our know-how,” said Joël Hounsinou, Managing Director of Bolloré Transport & Logistics Côte d’Ivoire.