Asia, the Middle East and Latin America will be the main regions driving a gradual recovery andthen low growth of the world air cargo market over the next few years while Europe and North
America will lag behind, according to new forecasts from IATA.The international airline association said in its latest industry financial outlook presentedyesterday that cargo markets have contracted by 2% so far this year and cargo yields are down 2% on2011 levels. “Although world trade is still expanding, the pattern of economic growth, concentratedin the emerging markets, has favoured ocean over air freight,” IATA commented.
This analysis reflects recent comments by FedEx CEO Fred Smith, who highlighted the highermarket share of ocean freight and air express compared to traditional air freight, as well assimilar comments by DHL and UPS executives on market trends.
In 2013, cargo demand is expected to increase by 1.4% but this will not be enough to make up forthe 2% decline in 2012. “The mismatch between growth rates for passenger and cargo demand tends tolead to cargo capacity in excess of demand and yields falling by 1.5%,” IATA predicted.
More positively, IATA predicted in its recent Airline Industry Forecast 2012-2016 thatinternational freight volumes will grow at 3% per annum to total 34.5 million tonnes in 2016. Thiswould be 4.8 million more tonnes of air cargo than the 29.6 million tonnes carried in 2011. The 3%average growth figure would kick off with 1.4% growth in 2013 and reach 3.7% by 2016, according tothe association.
At a regional level, Asia, the Middle East and Latin America will grow faster than Europe andNorth America over the next five years (2012-2016), IATA analysts are forecasting.
In Asia-Pacific, international freight demand will rise 3% a year on average, in line withglobal growth over the period. Routes within and connected to the Asia-Pacific region will comprisesome 57% of cargo shipments in future. Freight carriage within the Asia-Pacific region will accountfor around 30% of the expected total global increase in freight tonnage over the period.
The Middle East will be the fastest-growing region with a 4.9% average annual increase ininternational freight demand, while Africa’s international cargo demand will rise 4%. LatinAmerica, too, will be a strong growth region and international freight demand will increase 4.4%per annum, according to IATA.
In contrast, international freight demand in North America will rise only 2.4% and Europe’sinternational freight demand will grow just 2.2% a year, the slowest for any region.
The regional figures are reflected in the forecasts for individual countries. The five fastestgrowing international freight markets up to 2016 period will be Sri Lanka (8.7% CAGR), Vietnam(7.4%), Brazil (6.3%), India (6.0%) and Egypt (5.9%). Five of the 10 fastest growing countries arein the Middle East North Africa (MENA) region, reflecting MENA’s growing importance ininternational air freight.
By 2016, the largest international freight markets will be the United States (7.7m tonnes),Germany (4.2m), China (3.5m), Hong Kong (3.2m), Japan (2.9m), the United Arab Emirates (2.5m), theRepublic of Korea (1.9m), the United Kingdom (1.8m), India (1.6m) and the Netherlands (1.6m),according to IATA.
