Financially, following on from the crash of 2009, last year was a particularly frustrating year. But, it’s not how you fall but how you get up again that matters.

In their closing report for 2011, IATA shows a year-on-year contraction of 0.8% across the board in international freight for December 2011. However, it also reports an increase of 1.5% over the previous month, November 2011.
The major air freight region, Asia/Pacific, had the strongest growth at 2.2% month-on-month. The Middle East market continues to experience strong traffic demand, and North America, despite contracting over the year, managed to expand 6.5% in December compared to November. Africa on the other hand continued to decline with a negative growth of 1.8%.

Nonetheless, freight markets have shown an overall growth for 2 consecutive months. Business confidence, which serves as a leading indicator for changes in cargo markets, entered expansion territory in December. Business confidence indicators for China, France and Germany also show positive signs for manufacturing activity. Furthermore, indicators of export orders showed strong growth in December. In total, these could all be signs of the freight downturn bottoming out, with potential for growth in the coming months. Nevertheless, risks from European financial and economic downturn do remain a possibility and they could suppress any potential upward moment in cargo traffic.
For Africa, particularly, where passenger load factors managed to hold up to levels of the previous year, 2011 saw freight load factors decline. For freight the challenge of maintaining load factors, despite measures to reduce the cargo fleet, has been difficult as traffic has fallen away considerably, and additional capacity has entered through the passenger aircraft fleet – so losses, due to low load factors, have been the result.

Growing Africa

Emirates has announced that it has extended its reach into Africa with the launch of a new linked service to Lusaka and Harare, which means Zambia and Zimbabwe are now linked to key markets across Europe, the Far East, Australasia and the Indian Subcontinent. The Dubai-Lusaka-Harare service operates every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday using an A330-200 aircraft in a three class configuration.

“Zambia and Zimbabwe are both important emerging business and industrial centres, with economies that are projected to grow by over five per cent annually during the coming years,” said Nabil Sultan, Divisional Senior Vice President Revenue Optimisation & Distribution. “Emirates’ new service will play a significant role in supporting this growth by connecting Lusaka and Harare to our worldwide network, opening new conduits for trade, investment and tourism.”