PRESS ROOM

With a strong presence in global airfreight markets, the U-Freight Group notes that the latest figures released by IATA for July 2023 show that declines in air cargo volumes narrowed to their lowest level of the year so far ias the market continued to show signs of bottoming out.

The latest figures from IATA show that in July air cargo traffic in cargo tonne km (CTK) terms fell 0.8% year on year – the narrowest decline registered since February 2022.

Capacity in available CTK was up 11.2% on last July and the cargo load factor was down 5.1 percentage points to 42.1%.

“Although demand is now basically flat compared to 2022, this is an improvement on recent months’ performance that is particularly significant given declines in global trade volumes and rising concerns over China’s economy,” IATA said, adding that during the month both the Purchasing Managers Index and New Export Orders index indicated a decline in manufacturing and exports.

The association’s director general, Willie Walsh, was “cautiously optimistic”.

“Compared to July 2022, demand for air cargo was basically flat,” he said.

“Considering we were 3.4% below 2022 levels in June, that’s a significant improvement. And it continues a trend of strengthening demand that began in February.

“How this trend will evolve in the coming months will be something to watch carefully.

“Many fundamental drivers of air cargo demand, such as trade volumes and export orders, remain weak or are deteriorating.

“And there are growing concerns over how China’s economy is developing. At the same time, we are seeing shorter delivery times, which is normally a sign of increasing economic activity.

“Amid these mixed signals, strengthening demand gives us good reason to be cautiously optimistic.”

You can find more information about the U-Freight Group’s international airfreight logistics services by visiting the relevant pages on this website or speaking to your usual contact in our company.