EUROPE's cargo carrier Cargolux has joined a slew of international carriers that have added cities in China's interior to their freighter networks during the past nine months, by launching a twice-weekly freighter service to Chongqing in western China in May.
Other European cargo airlines that have initiated services in the mainland interior include FedEx, Korean Air and Singapore Airlines, not to mention the Chinese carriers. A few of these carriers have jumped into several emerging points.
Lufthansa, which had been one of the first carriers to fly freighters to Chengdu, started MD-11F flights to Chongqing this spring. Cathay Pacific boosted its presence in the interior, which had consisted of scheduled freighters to Chengdu and regular charters to Chongqing, to scheduled cargo flights serving Zhengzhou and Chongqing; and AirBridgeCargo (ABC), which resumed flights to Zhengzhou last fall after a brief hiatus, added Chongqing and Chengdu to its roster this spring.
Cathay Pacific and ABC have ambitions to boost their capacity at the newly developed points as soon as possible. ABC currently runs seven flights a week to Zhengzhou - five are routed over Chengdu, and two fly through Chongqing, reported Atlanta-area Air Cargo World. "We're planning to make that 14 flights a week. Ultimately, we should have daily service out of all three points," said ABC vice president Robert Song.
Zhengzhou was the most recent addition for Cathay Pacific. It is currently served twice a week, but the plan is to eventually go up to four or five frequencies each week. The carrier's weekly routings to Chongqing and Chengdu stand at four and three, respectively, at the moment. James Woodrow, the carrier's general manager of cargo sales and marketing, said that management is considering adding up to six flights a week to each point.
The migration of manufacturing from the coastal provinces to the interior has pushed these new gateways onto the global stage. "Volumes from the interior have been increasing as more high-tech customers moved inland," said Li Wenjun, head of air freight for China at DHL Global Forwarding.
First and foremost, the production of notebooks and smartphones has driven the rise in air freight demand out of the new points. "Loads are up and down. It's feast or famine in Chongqing. It helps that we route our flights over Zhengzhou," said ABC's Mr Song.
Chengdu has a strong contingent of auto manufacturers aside from Foxconn and Intel, leaders in the city's phalanx of high-tech producers. In Zhengzhou, Foxconn has been the main driver of development. The Taiwanese contract manufacturer has doubled the export volume of Henan province. "Zhengzhou is one of the fastest-growing centres for electronics manufacturing in the mainland," said Nick Rhodes, director and general manager of cargo at Cathay Pacific.
Other carriers have focused more on the two emerging gateways in the Sichuan province, where they see stronger traffic. "We have volumes out of Zhengzhou, but it is 30 per cent of what we have out of Chongqing and Chengdu," said Gerhard Blumensaat, director for airfreight, central China, at DB Schenker.
At their new feeding grounds, freighters also have to contend with rising belly capacity, most of which comes courtesy of the Chinese carriers. Titus Diu, chief operating officer of Air China Cargo said the airline's belly capacity has grown considerably with the introduction of B777ERs, which started coming on stream last year.
The cargo carrier will get two final B747-400BCFs from Cathay Pacific soon, and it has no intention of parking them, according to Mr Diu. Meanwhile, the carrier's contingent of B777-ER passenger planes will go up from the current fleet of seven to 16 by the end of next year.
