Air, Freight News

Airfreight recovery tails off

[ December 2, 2020   //   Chris ]

Global airfreight declined 1% year-on-year in December, the first decline since the recovery started six months ago, said analysts CLIVE Data Services and TAC Index.

From a low of -37% in April, the gap in year-on-year air cargo volumes has been steadily closing in the subsequent months to the end of October, by which time the margin versus 2019 volumes had reduced to -12%. In November, however, the gap rose slightly to -13% as the coronavirus continued to take its toll on global trade and international supply chains.

This validates a signal first identified by CLIVE Data Services in the final week of October 2020 when air cargo’s ‘dynamic load factor’ – calculated on both the volume and weight perspectives of cargo flown and capacity available – unexpectedly slipped by 1.5%.

New data for the four weeks ending 29 November shows that capacity – up 3.0% month-on-month – outpaced demand, with chargeable weight increasing by just 2.5%. CLIVE managing director Niall van de Wouw said that the air cargo industry can take some comfort from the positive news of successful vaccine developments and the global demand shipments of the vaccine will hopefully produce for air cargo supply chains

Tags: Clive