Blockade backlash: Qatar to ‘expedite’ launch of new routes as Doha airfreight surges

Qatar Airways will “expedite” the launch of new routes in response to the ongoing blockade by Saudi Arabia and other Arabian Gulf and North African countries, the carrier’s CEO, Akbar al Baker, told Bloomberg earlier this week.

The airline upped the ante today, announcing that it was moving to buy up stakes in American Airlines, with an initial investment of up to 4.75 percent, and potentially moving that figure up to 10 percent, assuming board and regulatory approval.

On the freight side, Qatar Airways and other carriers that service the country are seeing a yet-unquantified surge in volumes, in response to disruptions in overland freight from Saudi Arabia. According to the West Mediterranean Exporters Association, Turkish imports into Qatar between May 1 and June 15 were up 724 percent, year-over-year.

With maritime freight between Turkey and Qatar taking about ten days, ocean trade between the two countries is surging as well.

If Saudi Arabia’s King Salman hoped to sever ties between Iran and Qatar with his diplomatic onslaught, that seems to be backfiring, as well. Iran Air said that they were ramping up airfreight deliveries of perishables to Qatar.

Jordan’s exporters are also relying on airfreight to circumvent the blockade. Saadi Abu Hammad, president of the Jordan Exporters and Producers Association for Fruit and Vegetables, told local media that 90 tonnes of fruits and vegetables were being exported to Qatar daily via air.

On a purely numerical basis, airfreight lacks the capacity to compensate for embargoed freight from Saudi Arabia and its allies, however there is a real surge in airfreight into Doha. When Doha’s Hamad International Airport and Qatar Airways both release their statistics from this period, it will be interesting to see what role airfreight played in averting a crisis that al Baker likened to the Soviet blockade of West Berlin in the 1940s and has called an “intimidation game.”