Vol. 9 No. 41                                                            WE COVER THE WORLD                                               Monday March 28, 2010

     Since yesterday (Sunday March 28), Continental Airlines connects Newark-Munich daily nonstop with Boeing B767-200 passenger aircraft. It is the first time for more than a decade that the U.S. airline lands in the Bavarian capital, well known for tasty beers, pretzels and the local’s preference for wearing Lederhosen (leather pants).
     “These flights give us direct access to the important southern German and neighboring Austrian air freight markets and transport times of shipments will be reduced,” comments Andreas Gutberlet, (left) CO’s Director Cargo Sales Europe, Western Asia and Africa.
     The service supplements Continental’s recently launched Houston-Frankfurt route, which has proven to be a strong cargo performer. “Germany is a powerhouse cargo market and we are excited about tapping into the potential of Bavaria’s pharmaceutical, electronic and automotive centers,” said Jim McKeon, (below) Senior Director of Sales, Continental Airlines Cargo.
     “We bring a strong ride-as-booked franchise into the market and believe that Munich will be a logical extension for our customers,” he added.
     “These Continental flights complement Lufthansa’s twice daily services to New York and offer passengers a travel alternative due to the early arrival and departure of the aircraft,” comments Ingo Anspach of airport company Flughafen Muenchen GmbH. Flight CO106 lands at 7:40 a.m. local time, returning as CO107 at 9:20 a.m. to Newark Liberty International.
     Munich becomes the fourth German city to be served with daily flights to the New York area by CO after Frankfurt, Berlin and Hamburg. The airline also operates daily service between Frankfurt and Houston since November 2009. MUC is the 30th destination in Continental's overall trans-Atlantic network.
     Freight handling agent at local Franz Joseph Strauss International is airport subsidiary Cargogate. Continental Cargo’s Frankfurt-based Central European headquarters with two additional staff being recruited will be handling and managing sales.
     “For the time being we don’t intend to open up our own station in Munich but will do the sales job from our Rhein/Main office,” states manager Gutberlet.
     And more Continental news on the horizon. According to Andreas his airline will deploy B777-200s instead of B767s on the daily Frankfurt-Newark route commencing April 17. A further upgrade from B767 to B777 aircraft is scheduled for Frankfurt-Houston, too, beginning in June. The aircraft changes, together with the new Munich services “will lift our transport capacity to and from Germany by a remarkable 40 percent,” Herr Gutberlet concludes. Feeding and de-feeding will be done by truck.
     “We operate a tightly knit road feeder network within Europe,” Gutberlet says.
     As far as the market situation is concerned the manager sees some light at the end of the tunnel. “In Q4 we saw an upswing of tonnage and revenues compared to the months before in 2009. This trend accelerated since January, however, we will need a longer growth period to regain the high volumes flown in 2008.”
     As “quite encouraging” he values the trend of paired traffic flows on both trans-Atlantic routes. “In the past the loads were quite unbalanced with German and European exports dominating. Meanwhile imports have picked up equalizing volumes on both east- and westbound flights.”
     Most of CO’s shipments flown across the Atlantic are labeled general cargo. In addition the carrier offers a variety of products like ‘ClimateSecure’ for temperature sensitive items, the animal dedicated service ‘PetSafe’, and ‘COSecure’ for all sorts of valuables. Very fast transports can be booked as either ‘Express’, ‘CMR’ (Confirmed Must Ride) or ‘QuickPak’, depending on the size of the shipments or if time guarantee is required. These special products are outgrowing general cargo but still remain a minor contributor to the overall tonnage.
Heiner Siegmund


At World Cargo Symposium Vancouver 2010

Mike Malik, Aloha Air Cargo

Jay Shelat, Jet Airways Cargo

Mark Mohr, Continental Cargo

Update ASEAN China Free Trade

     The world’s third largest free trade zone kicked off in China and within the ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian nations) last month.
    The ACFTA (ASEAN-China Free Trade Agreement), covering around 1.9bn consumers, is first being applied to China and six ASEAN countries
(Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand) that are removing tariffs on nearly 7,000 groups of goods and services, i.e.
90% of intra-trade flows.
    Meanwhile, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam have been granted a phasing-out period until 2015 to lift import taxes on Chinese products.
    The new free trade zone is expected to further boost investment and trade volumes within the area, not only commodity exports to China in particular but also Chinese manufactured exports to ASEAN countries.
    However, competition, especially from China, will also grow, given similar industrial structures between China and ASEAN.
    The latter represents the biggest threat for the least developed ASEAN countries and many industries in the region.
    China has gone to great lengths to reach an agreement on the ACFTA as it is likely to strengthen its regional dominance.
    Although trade tariffs have been reduced significantly over time, several countries fear an invasion of low-cost Chinese goods benefiting from a weak RMB and multiple subsidies.
    But all is not working as planned for all the ACFTA participants:  Indonesia is considering applying for a delay in removing tariffs in several less competitive industries such as electronics, textiles or steel.
    The Indonesian government has sent a letter to China requesting a renegotiation of the ASEAN-China Free Trade Agreement [ACFTA].
    “The Director General for International Trade Gusmardi [Bustami] (left)sent a letter of request to renegotiate with China. The request is still in process and will take some time,” Industry Ministry M.S. Hidayat announced.
    Hidayat further said that Gusmardi had been communicating with the Chinese government over the renegotiation, which he believed to be in progress. President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono previously said that he would pursue talks with China to avoid negative impacts from the free trade deal between ASEAN and China.
    The government is seriously tackling damaged roads and electricity shortages to enable local industries and SMEs to face the implications of the ACFTA.
    "Infrastructure problems remain something of concern to us. They have even triggered inordinate increases in production costs in the country.
    Therefore, the government will focus its attention on this sector," Gusmardi Gustami said.
    The government had also set up a special team to handle infrastructural problems for anticipating ACFTA`s implications and opportunities for the Indonesian economy, he told a seminar here.
    Apart from any possible implications, he was confident in the capability of North Sumatra`s small- and medium-scale businessmen, particularly those in the agro-business sector, to compete with Chinese products.
Over the past three years, Indonesia`s economic growth was also "good enough".
    Indonesian exporters could expend their markets in such regions as Africa, Middle East, and Asia, said Gustami, who serves as director general of the trade ministry’s international trade cooperation.
    At the Association of Young Indonesian Business Community (HIMPI)-North Sumatra Chapter organized seminar, Chairman of North Sumatran Forum for  SMEs Cahyo Pramono also expressed his confidence in the Indonesian SMEs’ toughness in facing the ACFTA.
    But the government needs to take sides to local SMEs to make them stronger, he said. ACFTA implementation triggered a public debate.
    Concerning with its negative impacts on the Indonesian economy, some called on the government to renegotiate the agreement with China.
    In response to the call, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono recently admitted that renegotiating the implementation of ACFTA was needed to prevent the emergence of serious problems in the Indonesian economy.
    The ACFTA, based on an agreement signed in 2004, introduced zero tariffs on 6,682 tariff posts in 17 sectors, including 12 in manufacturing and five in agriculture, mining and maritime sectors.
Gordon Feller

Enno Osinga

Senior Vice President Cargo

Schiphol Amsterdam Airport

Too Much Not Enough For ATC

     It’s not easy to set up an interview with Ingo Zimmer these days. “We are extremely busy and have little time to talk to the media,” states the CEO of Frankfurt-based GSSA ATC Aviation Services Ltd. Since months the export volumes moved by the agent are rising steadily.
     “Last year’s Q4 was already pretty satisfying compensating the relatively weak period before. Ever since, the tonnage is practically going through the roof, including in February and the first days of March,” reports Ingo.
     He added that ATC could currently well need two or three more weekly B747 freighter flights on routes from Germany to Fareast for uplifting the masses of goods shippers and their agents are eager to move to China, South Korea or Japan.
     “The export volumes from central Europe, mainly Germany to East Asia presently exceed the capacity offered by carriers. That’s why air freight rates will increase soon,” states Herr Zimmer.
     In recent times the shipping industry had turned to ocean vessels to have their goods transported rather than use air in order to save costs, now there seems to be a trend in the opposite direction.
     “The reason might be that getting loans from banks is increasingly difficult for shippers,” surmises manager Zimmer. So with ocean freight running roughly five weeks from Hamburg, Rotterdam and other major ports in Western Europe to harbors like Incheon, Tokyo or Shanghai consignors have to wait to be paid by their clients for quite a while.
     “To bridge this time gap and cover their costs they often need bank loans on short terms,” argues Zimmer
     Currently GSSA ATC has contracted a monthly uplift capacity of 6,000 tons. With more to come, announces Ingo, like additional flights by his client ANA. Beginning in June the Japanese carrier will commence flying the Narita-Munich route each day, deploying B777 passenger aircraft. It’s the airline’s second destination in Germany after their daily Tokyo-Frankfurt service with Boeing 777s.
     Zimmer says, “By upping their weekly departures soon from seven to fourteen, ANA will offer the German air freight market a monthly belly-hold capacity of about 1,000 tons.”
     Additional capacity would also ease some constraints on trade lanes between central Europe and South Korea.
     “We presently are faced with some space problems there. Therefore, two more weekly freighter frequencies by Asiana Cargo, our partner, would ease the situation,” states Zimmer.
     Right now the Korean airline offers five weekly services with B747-400Fs between Frankfurt and Seoul in addition to their daily B777 passenger flights.
 
Screen Gems. Air Cargo News FlyingTypers Publisher Geoffrey Arend and ATC Aviation Services Ingo Zimmer chart GSA development inside ATC Frankfurt Cargo City Süd.

    Another major ATC partner is newcomer ACG Air Cargo Germany that deploys two B747-400 special (converted) freighters on routes between Frankfurt-Hahn airport, Hong Kong and Shanghai. “They are doing pretty well as their high load factor indicates,” the manager lauds.
     Additionally, ATC is partnering with Etihad Airways of Abu Dhabi and Liege-based TNT. Etihad, the Abu Dhabi carrier lands ten times per week in Frankfurt and daily in Munich with A330 passenger equipment. Two weekly freighter flights with MD-11F to Frankfurt-Hahn complement their German market activities. TNT Airways offers Liege-China six times a week and Liege-Singapore twice-weekly deploying Jumbo freighter B747-400Fs on both routes.
     “The capability of all that uplift space, including Royal Air Maroc and Ethiopian Airlines makes us the fourth biggest capacity provider in Germany,” Zimmer emphasizes. Before long his ATC will catapult itself on to the next level when Japanese ANA commences their Munich flights in June.
Heiner Siegmund

     A mid-sized forwarding agency from Kelsterbach near Frankfurt Germany got involved with the media insuring that that ARD and ZDF Broadcast Network in Germany were ready and able to report from the Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver back home last month.
     Working with service partner Lufthansa Cargo from early this year by the time the flame was lit until it was finally extinguished—camera, editing table, and studio decoration entrusted to Globe Cargo were on location delivering the latest news, including Germany’s stellar Olympic performance this year.
     We are outside in the hallway at Globe Cargo Kelsterbach. Looking around the place reveals a lot about the man whose firm is located on the first floor of a bare storage and office complex not far from the Frankfurt Rhein-Main Airport.
     Sure Globe is in the business of shipping highly sophisticated and valuable broadcast equipment, but this is also a company that apparently in some manner is driven by a love for sport.
     An Olympic Winter Games” Salt Lake City 2002“ poster adorns one wall.
     A couple of steps away, a 2002 Football World Cup in Korea and Japan sign joins many other mementos of major sporting events on display including a complete collection of official accreditations - to the 1999 alpine Ski World Championship in Vail/Colorado.
     “I was there at every event,” says Globe President Horst Jungbluth (55) proudly meaning this in a double sense: as spectator and as businessman.
     In 1999 he worked for the first time for the ZDF.
     At that time, Jungbluth, brought up in nearby Mainz and trained as a forwarding agent at Frankfurt Airport, had forwarded the complete TV-equipment for the “Mainzelmännchen“ to the Ski World Championship in the Rocky Mountains in Vail.
     “Back then we had Lufthansa Cargo move 15 tons for us,“ he smiles.
     “This year our airlift partner down the road here moved more than ten times that amount or 220 tons. “
     As 2010 began studio equipment and technical devices were delivered by ship to Vancouver but mid-January new consignments were shipped via Globe by air-freight to Olympia.
     Some containers, which were carried in the cargo-hold of a normal Lufthansa A-340 on the 11-hour flight, were packed with cameras, audio-equipment network-technology and office documents.
     Jungbluth who operates Globe from offices in Frankfurt, Düsseldorf and Hamburg with a dedicated team of air cargo professionals including Ulrich Jungbluth (who may be Horst’s better looking brother) says he uses Lufthansa Cargo as a preferred partner of the forwarding agency in Kelsterbach because of “their service quality and reliability.”
     With regard to the Olympics, an additional substantial argument for choosing the airline, is that Lufthansa flies daily non-stop from Frankfurt to Vancouver.
     “With a direct flight,” says Jungbluth, ”nothing can be left behind while enroute.
     “What has been loaded at the departure point will arrive at the destination airport for certain.”
     We wonder how it is in this land where logistics is an educated art, can Globe cargo hold its own with so many big companies and high profile service suppliers that he competes with?
     Horst says he has learned that in his business, improvisation is everything.
     “We are dedicated to being the best—big enough to get the job done but also hands-on with customer service all the way,” he assures.
Geoffrey

 

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