Air cargo plans to take off despite slowdown

28 Jul, 2008, 0205 hrs IST, ET Bureau

Indian companies are going ahead with their cargo plans amidst slowdown and lower projected demand for the cargo planes. The Boeing Company, the US-based aircraft manufacturer, in its 2008 Current Market Outlook (CMO) for India, has said the country will need only 24 dedicated freighters for the 2008-2027. The aircraft maker has not increased the forecast for cargo planes from last year (2007-2026). This is when the company has revised the projections for passenger plans to 977 (2008-2027) from last year's projection (2007-2016) of 887. Boeing's 20-year forecast takes into account the industry's near-term challenges, including slowdown in world economy, surging fuel prices, slowing traffic growth and concerted action by airlines to balance costs and revenues.

Loading and unloading of cargo in Kolkata airport automated

Press Trust Of India, Kolkata, July 23, 2008

In a bid to automate and speed up loading and unloading of cargo planes, two sophisticated machines have been installed at the N S C Bose International Airport by the AAI.
The Automated Storage Retrieval System (ASRS) imported from Malaysia would be used for loading cargo planes and the Elevated Traffic Vehicle System (ETVS) from Germany for unloading them, Senior Manager (Cargo) N S C Bose International Airport K J Raju told PTI.
The machines, the first of their kind to be installed by the Airports Authority of India (AAI), each costing Rs 10 crore would reduce the time for loading and unloading by at least ten hours, Raju said.
The ASRS designed by Malaysian company Metronic has a capacity of unloading 2,000 tons of cargo per day, while the volume currently was 80 tons per day.
"So long we had to do everything manually which is very tedious and took a fair amount of time," Raju said.
"We have imported this machine keeping in view the increasing volume of work in the next 25 years" he said.
The ASRS would unload cargo and store it after checking and numbering it in a matter of five hours, which now took 15 hours, Raju said.
The ETVS has a capacity of 280 tons which would help in loading materials directly from trucks to cargo aircraft.
"At present the volume of export at the airport is around 68 tons per day. We have imported this machine keeping in mind the increased demand of export particularly leather, garments and auto parts to countries like Bangladesh, Hong Kong, Japan, UAE and the European countries," Raju said.
Both machines are now at the cargo building in the International terminal, but they would be shifted to a new building which is under construction.

Captain Gopi: Determine To Fly Higher And Higher

22 Jul, 2008, 0001 hrs IST,Juhi Shrivastava, ET Bureau

His vision was not restricted to having the biggest airline or the biggest company, it was a goal which was attainable and yet not quantifiable. Captain Gorur R Iyengar Gopinath, also called as Captain Gopi by his acquaintance, left army after 8 years of work to seek newer vistas. After achieving success as a Seri culturist, he made his foray in the aviation sector and launched ‘Deccan Aviation’ – a Heli-charter company. One wonders where the inspiration for all this comes from and pat comes the answer. “The most important inspiration comes from one’s vision – the dream to make a difference, an impact which benefits people, society and the country regardless of one’s field. The challenge before me was to build an airline that can effectively cater to the top and the bottom-line of the consumer pyramid and deliver as an efficient business model,” Captain Gopi states. As the Chairman and Managing Director of Deccan it’s been a roller coaster ride for him. “I don’t believe in management theories and have always chosen to follow on my instinct and do my own research,” he declares. The biggest hurdle in front of Captain Gopi in achieving this dream was of funding. “It took me four years just to get a single helicopter on lease,” he reveals. Bureaucratic challenges would be a close second. “I had to deal with the red carpet and the red tapism, bouquets and brickbats all simultaneously,” he adds. Being a die hard optimist he absolutely refused to give up on anything. With every fresh challenge he strains himself to innovate and do things differently, and overcome the hurdle. Captain Gopi recalls, “When we launched Deccan, our first flight had caught fire and we were written off. Then there were strict government controls and predatory pricing from the competition to deal with.” In spite of all this he decided to continue to surge ahead against all odds, by developing cost efficiency, the fastest aircraft turn around time in the industry alongside wide connectivity and ticketing access. The man is geared up again to launch his another venture – Deccan Cargo – an integrated air and ground delivery system which will offer a seamless transportation network. “This venture will offer logistics solutions for manufacturing industries which will have a huge cost impact by eliminating the need for warehousing and transportation infrastructure,” he declares. His success is not governed by any formula or strategy. “There is no recipe for success; an entrepreneur has to pursue his or her passion with single minded determination and be aware that we cannot let the fear of stumbling make us give up moving ahead,” he affirms. He accepts that an entrepreneur has to grapple with many difficulties and setbacks and the only way forward is by keeping a resolute focus on the objective. “It is important to consistently remind oneself why one has ventured out in the first place. Most importantly, learn to assimilate failure. No failure or disappointment is a closed chapter. It is an invaluable opportunity to rectify errors and move forward,” he advocates. “The dream to empower every Indian to fly may not be entirely accomplished in my life time but it does get realised everyday as more and more Indians take to the skies,” he proudly accepts. On concluding note, he visions to expand his company and cater to wider domestic and global operations.

Maya’s airport crashlands in politcal mess

Zeenat Nazir (posted online on Indian Express on July 19, 2008)
Proposal for Greater Noida airport lying with law ministry for more than four months
New Delhi, July 18: With changing political dynamics at the Centre, Bahujan Samajwati Party chief Mayawati’s pet airport project at Greater Noida in Uttar Pradesh seems to have gone into deep freeze.

Sources in the civil aviation ministry said that the Rs 5,000 crore greenfield Taj International Aviation Hub (TIAH) in Jewar — first conceptualised in 2001 by the then Mayawati government — was now unlikely to be pushed ahead anytime soon. “The proposal for the airport is lying with the law ministry for
more than four months now. It is unlikely that it would be approved now, given the current political situation,” sources in the civil aviation ministry said.
The law ministry has been examining the Greater Noida airport proposal ever since a Group of Ministers (GoM) was constituted in February. The GoM was to look into implicit and explicit agreements signed with the operators of the Delhi’s IGI airport, located just 70 km away, and assess if the proposed new airport would violate any contractual obligations.
To that end, the two ministries were to jointly submit a studied view on technical and legal aspects. While the civil aviation ministry had forwarded a favourable assessment to the Law Ministry well over four months ago, the latter is yet to come back with a view. “We have reminded the law ministry to submit their paper, but there does not seem to be a sense of urgency now,” the source said.
The proposed Greater Noida airport was expected to handle around 3.9 million passengers annually by 2011-12, or roughly one-fifth of the current traffic at the New Delhi airport, according to estimates by the state government. It would also seek to derive a significant share of revenues through shopping malls, hotels, a cargo hub, an aviation academy and residential complexes as part of the airport project.
“The important thing to be considered is that there should be a level playing field between the proposed Noida and existing Delhi airport. For instance, in Delhi airport there is scope to commercially utilise only five per cent of the land. If around 10-20 per cent of land is available for commercial exploitation at Greater Noida, it is foreseeable that it may offer facilities at lesser cost and gain an upper hand,” a senior civil aviation official told The Indian Express earlier.
• According to AAI, the estimated traffic at the IGI Airport will be 108 million per year by 2015-16, leading to severe congestion and a need for more capacity.
• The aviation ministry said that the Greater Noida airport could solve this problem

Cargo movement intact

M. Soundariya Preetha (published in The Hindu on 14 July 2008)

For an industrialised district as Coimbatore that has a basket of products exported to various destinations, international connectivity is essential.
Garments, components and castings are some of the products that get air lifted from the district regularly. The air cargo complex here handled nearly 3,000 tonnes of cargo in 2006-2007.
It was 3,476 tonnes in 2007-2008. This year, during the first three months, it was about 300 tonnes. The manufacturers here use airlines for cargo movement mainly to meet delivery schedules and to send samples, says an official at the air cargo complex.
Manohar D. Menon of Peirce Leslie India points out that Coimbatore has Air Arabia, Silk Air and Sri Lankan Airlines with three to four services a week from each.
Each flight has 3 tonnes to 5 tonnes of cargo loading capacity. Though the cargo charges have not gone up, the fuel surcharge has been increased. It is Rs. 54 a kg now as against Rs. 38 a kg about two months ago.
The Airports Authority of India has also increased the Terminal Storage and Processing charges.
The volume is not increasing here substantially and the costs are one of the reasons, he says.
Facilities also should be improved. For instance, Coimbatore should have facilities for plant quarantine certification to encourage vegetable cargo movement. These items now go to other airports, he says.
A garment industry representative in Tirupur says when garments are sent by air, the charges are seven to eight times more than regular shipment.
Hence, exporters resort to it mainly to send samples and when they are under pressure to meet delivery schedule

Deccan to be Nagpur hub’s first cargo operator

Vivek Deshpande (Posted online on Indian Express on July 11, 2008)

NAGPUR:: The Multimodal International Hub Airport at Nagpur (MIHAN) project got its first major shot in the arm with the Deccan Cargo Pvt Ltd (DCPL) signing an agreement with the Maharashtra Airport Development Company (MADC), the special purpose vehicle implementing MIHAN, to set up its air cargo hub in the MIHAN’s SEZ.

Maharashtra chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, who is also MADC chairman, and DCPL chief Captain Gopinath signed an agreement here on Thursday. “We are likely to actually start the cargo operations by January or February next year,” said Gopinath. “We will have a fleet of ten aircraft to begin with.”
Gopinath said, with the Deccan hub at Nagpur, the stage is set for the city to become the logistical capital of India, and in 30-odd years of the whole world. Around 50 acres of land has been given for the Deccan project and more could be given if needed.

Rise in airport fee, ATF may hit cargo tonnage growth

Anirban Chowdhury / New Delhi July 06, 2008, 0:04 IST(Business Standard)

A rise in aviation turbine fuel (ATF) and spiralling airport charges have played havoc with cargo airline companies. According to industry forecasts, cargo tonnage growth, which stood at 10.5 per cent last year, might slow down to below 10 per cent this year.

For cargo carrier Blue Dart, for instance, land lease rentals, the amount paid for facilities such as warehouses and dockets, have increased from anywhere between 7.5 per cent to as much as 450 per cent during the last one year. Blue Dart operates to seven airports - New Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Ahmedabad.
These places account for about 90 per cent of the cargo carried in India.Besides, limited infrastructure for cargo at various airports is the main problem for airlines.
A Blue Dart executive said that while in its tonnage carried has increased by almost five times in the last 10 years, the space allocated to them at several airports like Delhi have remained the same due to limited infrastructure at the airports.
Indian airports fall far behind in terms of cargo facilities. While the Frankfurt Airport in Germany handles, 5,200 metric tonnes of cargo a day, much more than an Indian airport handles in one month.
"Cargo is a neglected sector because there are very few dedicated domestic cargo carriers in India. Almost 80 per cent of cargo carried in India is carried in the belly-hold space of passenger aircraft," said an industry expert.
An Air India Cargo executive said, "We have less problem of space since our capacity (freighter as well as passenger) is increasing at a greater than our tonnage. While most of our freighter aircraft are chartered, majority of the cargo carried by us is still transported in the belly-hold space of our passenger aircraft."
Air India's cargo operations still accounts for merely 7-8 per cent of its total revenue.
Also, like passenger carriers, freighter airlines are also severely affected by rising jet fuel prices. For Air India cargo, ATF costs as a percentage of total costs has gone up from 25 to 50 per cent during the last seven to eight months.
According to company sources, the carrier has recently introduced a fuel surcharge of Rs 5,000/tonne or its domestic operations.
Air freighter charges for Blue Dart have also shot up by around 20 per cent.
"Freighter aircraft are usually less fuel efficient than passenger aircraft as they are passenger aircraft turned in to freighters," said a cargo airline executive.

Dragonair flight to Hong Kong

The Statesman July 3, 2008

Dragonair, a sister concern of Cathay Pacific, today launched its direct flight from Bangalore to Hong Kong, covering the distance in five hours. Its maiden flight arrived in the city from Hong Kong in the wee hours of the morning. In the process, it also became the only airline to operate a non-stop service between the two cities. The round trip fare for now is pegged at Rs 22,000. Together with Cathay Pacific Airways, Dragonair will now operate 35 flights from India. It recently added 20 new flights a week including additional services from Chennai, making a total of 28 flights a week from India to Hong Kong from different locations. According to Mr Algernon Yao, general manager, ground services and international affairs, Dragonair, along with Cathay Pacific, seized the opportunity to tap the available potential in India subsequent to the bilateral agreement that was announced earlier this year. He told newsmen here that the airline had commenced operations from the city following the huge potential that was waiting to be tapped. Despite the soaring prices of aviation fuel coupled with the high inflation in the country, the airline was confident of doing well. This optimism followed the absence of capacity till now. Dragonair also hopes to exploit the growing demand for business and leisure travel among Indians. The number of such travellers is expected to jump substantially. Already, the tourism promotion authorities in the island are gearing up to launch a major campaign to attract more Indian tourists, leveraging the advantage of a direct flight. Mr Tom Wright, general manager, India, middle east Africa and Pakistan, for Cathay Pacific, on his part, added that cargo remained a major part of the airlines' strategy as it accounted for almost 30 per cent of its revenues.