At 3.36 million tonnes, Indian airports dealt with 7 per cent extra cargo in FY 2024 than within the earlier 12 months. Whereas home cargo elevated by 3 per cent, worldwide cargo elevated by 9.7 per cent in the course of the interval. But, this amount pales compared to the cargo dealt with by the most important international hubs. Hong Kong airport, the world’s busiest for cargo visitors, alone dealt with 4.3 million tonnes in CY 2023.
A significant factor that slows down, and thereby limits transshipment at Indian airports is the safety regulation requiring rescreening of the cargo — each home and worldwide. As an example, a Dubai-bound consignment flown in from Singapore through Mumbai is faraway from the pallet or container and X-rayed on the airport earlier than it’s despatched alongside. This provides up prices and complexities, making Indian airways and airports much less aggressive in comparison with friends.
Even cargo motion inside the nation requires rescreening if it entails a change in plane.
One other problem is the customs division’s requirement for a pre-clearance if items are flown to a world vacation spot on two completely different airways. Whereas the approval course of is automated, it’s nonetheless time-consuming, business executives complain.
“We work carefully with regulators and have created a transshipment excellence centre (TEC) on the airside in Delhi airport to behave as a zone exterior the cargo terminal to chop down course of time. We proceed to work carefully [with the regulators] to additional eradicate different inefficiencies which might be delaying transshipment. A few of the considerations being addressed on the highest ranges embrace full digitisation of transshipment documentation/ processing to eradicate guide interventions and paperwork, a relook at double screening of cargo, and so forth, to hasten cargo to match international requirements,” says Sanjiv Edward, chief govt officer of cargo at GMR group, which runs the Delhi and Hyderabad airports.
New alternatives
Delhi airport, the nation’s busiest, has positioned itself as ‘Southeast Asia’s main cargo hub’, facilitating transshipment of 8,000 tonnes of cargo from Bangladesh.
The transshipment facility for Bangladeshi cargo, which commenced operations final February, has proved to be a quicker and cost-effective route. Readymade clothes from Bangladesh now move by means of Delhi airport on their technique to European markets, together with Spain, the Netherlands and France, amongst others. After the US, the European Union is the second-largest export vacation spot for Bangladeshi attire, adopted by the UK and Canada.
“Main cargo airports and hubs have a selected concentrate on transshipment, which clocks about 40 per cent share within the complete cargo transacted by means of them. Nevertheless, for Delhi airport, the share is nearly 10 per cent; so the airport has sufficient headroom to enhance not solely in complete cargo quantity but additionally the share of transshipment cargo,” says Edward.
The Delhi airport is working with airways and non-scheduled carriers to discover new markets and increase enterprise. This consists of freight from neighbouring nations equivalent to Nepal to Europe and from Southeast Asia to Africa.
Air India, which has the most important worldwide community originating from Delhi amongst airways, can be pitching for a evaluate of transshipment insurance policies. The airline operates widebody Boeing plane to Europe, North America and Australia however is unable to supply aggressive air cargo providers because of the current rules.
World examples
It’s learnt that final month a delegation comprising cargo business executives, and representatives of the civil aviation ministry and the Bureau of Civil Aviation Safety had visited airports in Germany and Singapore to look at first-hand their cargo dealing with practices associated to transshipment.
The officers, nevertheless, weren’t accessible for remark.
The home air cargo business needs the federal government to introduce a programme to validate safety methods at abroad airports, on the traces of the European Union (EU) norms that require screening of all cargo and mail coming from a non-EU airport. This, they imagine, will obviate the necessity for rescreening and the ensuing delays.
Shortfall in infrastructure
The opposite challenges on floor embrace restricted availability of connecting flights for the onward journey, and velocity restrictions for the tractors and trollies that transfer pallets, business our bodies say.
“Cargo terminal operators have to make sure the whole dealing with of transshipment cargo in a time-bound and cost-effective method. Freight forwarders are mandated by exporters/importers to supply logistics on the most economical price. All such stakeholders have to work in a product-friendly atmosphere of simplified procedures. There are such a lot of challenges on the city-side [namely traffic snarls, parking issue and so on] additionally that freight forwarders and different customers face,” says CK Govil, president, Air Cargo Brokers Affiliation of India.
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