Global airfreight ‘poised for a record 2017’, says ACI

Montreal-based trade association Airports Council International (ACI) has reported year-on-year growth in air cargo volumes of 7.8% for November, putting the industry on track for a record-breaking 2017.
ACI said that the cargo business “continued to benefit from a strong growth in volumes in November thanks to global trade” and that this was “reflected in gains in export orders”.
African airports saw the highest rise in volumes, at 14.7%. North America and Europe followed, at 8.9% and 8.7% respectively. Asia-Pacific (up 7.2%), Latin America and the Caribbean (up 6.9%) and the Middle East (with more modest growth of 2.9%, but still picking up after a slowdown in October) all showed a positive result.
According to ACI: “International freight was the main driver for most of the increases, reaching +7.8% after slowing down to +4.4% over the three months prior to November. Airports in the Asia-Pacific region lead in volumes handled for export and overall growth.”
For the January-November 2017 period, total volumes rose by 8.2% globally in comparison to the same months of the previous year.
The association highlighted India, China, Japan and Thailand as showing double-digit international airfreight growth for the year to date (up by 17.9%, 16.7%, 12.8% and 11.5% respectively). Hong Kong’s international traffic rose by 9.5%.
In Europe, similar results occurred in Spain (up 15.6%), the UK (a rise of 13.2%) and Turkey (up 11.3%).
The US – the world’s largest domestic air cargo market – saw an increase of 5.1% year on year.
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