Hong Kong duo uplift more freight in soft market

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Wednesday, 16 February 2011

Cathay Pacific Airways and Dragonair traffic figures for January 2011 show an increase in cargo and mail carried year on year, though load factors fell due to the increase in capacity.

The two airlines carried 144,402 tonnes of cargo in January 2011, a rise of 8.9 per cent compared to January last year, while the cargo and mail load factor was down 7.1 percentage points to 67.8 per cent. Capacity, measured in available cargo/mail tonne kilometres, was up by 25.5 per cent, while cargo and mail tonne kilometres flown were up by 13.7 per cent.

Cathay Pacific general manager cargo sales and marketing James Woodrow said: “Freight volumes fell away a little following the 2010 year-end peak but, overall, traffic still held up quite well throughout the first month of 2011. Demand out of the key Hong Kong and mainland China markets was a little softer than anticipated but this freed up space to enable us to carry more shipments from other destinations in the network. The expected pre-Chinese New Year rush did not materialise to the extent seen in previous years.”