Asia-Pacific fleet: Aligning freighters to handle market shifts
In the midst of the market settling and growth slowing, at least seven Asian carriers started operating freighters for the first time in 2022, including Indonesia’s RGA-Black Stone Airlines and MIAT Mongolian Airlines, with at least five more expected to follow in 2023.
A key country in global trade, China recently eased restrictions and began to normalize trade but has been the epicenter of concerns surrounding the market downturn.
China still leads the global market for cross-border e-commerce with 30% of the distribution but has seen its volume decline by six percentage points since 2019 due to a lack of international capacity, Cargo Facts Consulting Managing Director Guillermo Ochovo said during a presentation on “Prospects and obstacles for future fleet development” at Cargo Facts EMEA 2023 in Dubai.
As oil prices stabilized, inflation slowed and global trade showed small signs of growth. The peak month of November saw cargo volume decrease by 18.6% year over year due to reduced trade and disruptions in supply chains caused by China’s rising COVID-19 cases, with capacity 4.5% lower when compared to 2021, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA).
While global export orders continue to decrease, IATA reported that the Asia-Pacific region was the world leader last year, accounting for 32.6% of the cargo tonne-kilometers.
Asia accounted for 5.9% of global air cargo traffic in 2021 and shipped more than 2.8 million tonnes in air freight, according to Boeing’s 2022 World Air Cargo Forecast.
Global fleet growing
Cargo Facts reported in July that Boeing’s Commercial Market Outlook (CMO) predicts 2,795 units will join the global fleet between 2022 and 2041, which is 185 more than had been predicted in its 2021 CMO. These consist of 515 production large widebodies, 425 production medium widebodies, 555 widebody conversions and 1,300 narrowbody conversions. Boeing anticipates the total fleet to grow from 2,240 freighters at the end of 2021 to 3,610 by the end of 2041.
Almost 40% of all new deliveries and conversion redeliveries in the next twenty years will be for the Asia-Pacific region, according to Boeing. As a result, the Asia-Pacific region will have 1,260 freighters by the end of 2041, with China’s freighter fleet in particular more than tripling in the next twenty years to 820 units.
For this analysis, in which Cargo Facts examined the freighter aircraft based in the Asia-Pacific region, “Asia Pacific” is defined as everything east of the Caspian Sea, including Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Iran as well as Australia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea and Nauru.
Aircraft considered in the analysis include all Airbus and Boeing freighter aircraft — whether production or converted — along with ATRs, BAe 146s and Saab 340s.
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