Middle Eastern carriers reported a decline of 25% year-on-year in May 2020
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) released the latest data for global air freight markets in May showing a slight improvement in the air cargo market.
However, capacity remains unable to meet demand as a result of the loss of belly cargo operations on passenger aircraft that have been parked.
Highlights are as follows:
- Global demand, measured in cargo tonne-kilometres (CTKs), fell by 20.3% in May (-21.5% for international operations) compared to the previous year. That is an improvement from the 25.6% year-on-year drop recorded in April.
- Global capacity, measured in available cargo tonne-kilometres (ACTKs), shrank by 34.7% in May (-32.2% for international operations) compared to the previous year, a slight deceleration from the 41.6% year-on-year drop in April.
- Belly capacity for international air cargo shrank by 66.4% in May compared to the previous year due to the withdrawal of passenger services amid the Covi-19 crisis (up slightly from the 75.1% year-on-year decline in April). This was partially offset by a 25.2% increase in capacity through expanded use of freighter aircraft.
- The cargo load factor (CLF) rose 10.4 percentage points in May. This was a slight decrease from the 12.8 percentage point rise in April.
- Global export orders continue to fall but at a slower pace. The Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) tracking new manufacturing export orders improved from the trough seen in April despite remaining in contraction territory.
“Air cargo demand is down by over 20% compared to 2019 and with most of the passenger fleet grounded capacity was down 34.7%. The gap between demand and capacity shows the challenge in finding the space on the aircraft still flying to get goods to market,” remarked Alexandre de Juniac, IATA’s Director General and CEO.
All regions suffered declines in May. Airlines in Europe and Latin America suffered the sharpest drops in year-on-year growth in total air freight volumes, while airlines in Asia-Pacific and the Middle East experienced slightly less dramatic declines. Airlines in North America and Africa saw more moderate drops compared to the other regions.
Middle Eastern carriers reported a decline of 25% year-on-year in May, a significant improvement from the 36.2% fall in April. Despite a number of carriers in the region maintaining some cargo capacity, traffic on all key routes was low. International capacity decreased 24.4%.
