AmsterdamReview Looking for newcomers
Paul van den Brink, interna- tional marketing director at Schiphol Area Development Company, believes that there is growing interest from foreign business in setting up around the Dutch capital’s air gateway. Perhaps partly because of the
growing strength of Dutch exports, particularly to China and elsewhere in the Far East, there has been demand from Chinese and Korean cargo agents interested in establishing a presence there. Generally, the improvement
Meanwhile, the Schiphol
Area Development Company is also continuing to promote Amsterdam Connecting Trade (ACT), which looks to develop the area further as a first-class multimodal hub. Development around the
in air freight volumes through Schiphol has prompted devel- opment around the airport, van den Brink observed.
van den Brink – growing interest from freight forwarders
capital currently includes work taking place on the highways linking Schiphol with the rest of the country, plus the Euro Carex high-speed rail project that could see Schiphol express freight moving to Paris and beyond by train, and vice versa. However, this latter scheme remains at an early stage, the
investment required having been seen as pro- hibitive in the economic climate of recent times.
Air France-KLMsees demand return
Marc Baan, Air France-KLM Cargo (AF-KLM Cargo) vice president marketing, e-com- merce and communication, believes that demand is coming back for the joint carrier’s cargo services. In the first quarter of its
financial year, between April and June, traffic in terms of freight tonne-km at AF-KLM Cargo (including its other service partner Martinair Cargo) was up by 3 percent year-on-year. And with capacity down by 3 percent
over the same quarter of 2009, the load factor rose by about 6 percent. Yield also recovered fromwhat Baan describes as the “unsustainable low levels of last year”. AF-KLM is gradually moving ahead on
its efforts to combine commercial activi- ties, serving customers through two hubs and three carriers, “yet via one face”. While adhering to its strategy of main-
taining capacity discipline in order to increase utilisation andmaximise return on assets, it is also continuing to assess shifting patterns of demand. For the
comingwinter season, freighter capacity is being reintroduced twice weekly on the Paris - Tokyo lane, adding about 200 tonnes a week of potential cargo uplift, while the addition of three B747 combi flights on the Amsterdam - Tokyo route will offer 100 tonnes of possible additional volumes each week on that sector. KLM has been a leading partner in
Schiphol’s SmartGate project, designed to improve the speed and quality of Cus- toms checks and control procedures, and the carrier has taken a major role in the development of e-services out of the Ams- terdamgateway, Baan commented.
Kales expects to enjoy boomyear in 2010
“Business to the Far East is very good but most sectors are recov- ering very well,” reveals Peter Kales, founder and head of Ams- terdam-based cargo general sales agent Kales. Over the course of the first five
months of 2010, volumes are up for Kales by 60 percent over the same period of last year, and 25 percent up on the same January - May period of 2008. “Things aremore than back to
normal,” Peter Kales enthused. “Yields are also coming up again, which is good news for every- body,” he continued, adding that while the closure of skies caused by the ash cloud in April this yearmay have cre- ated many problems, it also helped push up the yield. The Kales Charters operation is also doing
“unbelievably well”, recently handling ad hoc operations into theUS, Africa, Almaty, Bishkek,
Kales: “yields are also coming up again”
Austria – indeed worldwide, Peter Kales observed. It organised two charters
carrying equipment needed to combat the oil spill in the Gulf ofMexico – gear flown on Thai Cargo’s new B777 freighters from Amsterdam to Houston. The FIFAWorld Cup in South Africa has also been a source of charter business, he noted. Peter Kales has not been shy
of divesting his operation of unprofitable constituents, how- ever. On 1 April, Kales Air Cargo Trucking was transferred to European road freight giant Jan de Rijk, so that the com-
pany could concentrate more on its core GSA business, he said. With a total of 42 new airline contracts
signed during the course of 2009, Peter Kales concluded that 2010 looks like “it’s going to be a boomyear”.
Delta Air Lines steps ups its US - Amsterdam links
Delta Air Lines is increasing the frequency of its service on the Amsterdam- Seattle route fromseven to 10 flights fromthismonth (July). The airline will operate the service with A330-300 aircraft, adding three B767-300
services at the weekend. Delta will also resume its suspended daily widebody service between Amsterdamand
New York JFK as part of amassive expansion the carrier is undertaking to over 30 global destinations during the autumn period.
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19 July 2010
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