Cathay Pacific cargo sees decline in volume and yield

Hong Kong’s Cathay Pacific plans to remain “vigilant in order to best match our capacities to changes in market demand and trade flow,” commented cargo director Ronald Lam after the carrier suffered a 3.9 per cent year-on-year drop in cargo volumes in May to 168,270 tonnes.

“Our cargo business continued to be adversely affected by geopolitical tensions and resulting in dampened market sentiment. Despite positive capacity growth in May, cargo revenue saw negative growth over last year. Both volume and yield incurred decline year on year,” Mr Lam said.

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To withstand the current weak market conditions the airline plans to take an agile approach when making changes to its fleet deployment across its network. Writing in the airline’s Cargo Clan publication, head of cargo markets John Cheng said: “All signs point to the industry experiencing headwinds after two very good years.”

“This normal fluctuation has been exacerbated by global trade tensions affecting two of our principal markets, along with other geopolitical uncertainties around the globe,” he was cited as saying in a report by London’s Air Cargo News. “However, we can address these imbalances through agile redeployment of our fleet across our wider network, enabling us to match capacity to demand.

“We will also keep a close eye on the market, although this will not deter us from planning for the long term. We firmly believe in the importance of air cargo and we will continue to invest in developing new products and opportunities for our customers.” Over the first five months of the year volumes were five per cent lower than in the same period in 2018 at 815,175 tonnes.

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