civil
Cargo
Air Cargo provided a vital source of revenue for many airlines as passenger demand remained in the doldrums due to COVID-19 travel restrictions
Stellar Year for Air Cargo in 2021 The data released by IATA for global air freight markets showed that full-year demand for air cargo increased by 6.9 per cent in 2021
Photograph: Lufthansa Cargo
By Ayushee Chaudhary When the pandemic brought the aviation industry to a halt, cargo aviation came to the forefront to handle the situation of constant transporting of medical aids and stranded passengers across countries. Many commercial airlines also transitioned their carriers to be used for cargo purposes. Though the demand for cargo had its moments of fluctuations through the time, International Air Transport Association (IATA) noted that 2021 turned out to be an outstanding year for Air Cargo with a strong performance in December that witnessed the year-on-year going up 18.7 per cent. The data released by IATA for global air freight markets showed that full-year demand for air cargo increased by 6.9 per cent in 2021, compared to 2019 (pre-covid levels) and 18.7 per cent compared to 2020 following
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a strong performance in December 2021. “This was the second biggest improvement in year-on-year demand since IATA started to monitor cargo performance in 1990 (behind 2010’s 20.6 per cent gain), outpacing the 9.8 per cent rise in global goods trade by 8.9 percentage points,” the association noted. According to IATA’s Air Cargo Market Analysis, throughout the year, air cargo has been driven by a balance between robust demand for goods – including PPE at the end of the year – and supply chain issues partly linked to a lack of capacity. Global demand in 2021, measured in cargo tonne-kilometers (CTKs), was up 6.9 per cent compared to 2019 (7.4 per cent for international operations) while the capacity was noted to be 10.9 per cent below 2019 (-12.8 per cent for international
ISSUE 3 • 2022
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