MUMBAI: Eager to regain its prominence as a leading cargo carrier of South East Asia, MASKargo, made a strong pitch at the just-concluded three-day Air Cargo India 2016 event here.
The show, organised by the Mumbai-based STAT Media Group, has vaulted to become India's leading niche event for the air-cargo industry.
MASKargo, the cargo arm of Malaysia Airlines, occupied a large exhibition booth at the event, to showcase its products and services to a discerning crowd of dedicated air-cargo trade visitors who dropped by.
Ahmed Luqman Mohd Azmi, the Chief Executive Officer of MASKargo, told Bernama at the show that 2016 was crucial for Malaysia Airlines in respect of its transformation programme.
MASKargo currently operates a fleet of 4 A-330F freighter aircraft. Of these, only two are being deployed, with the others being sub-leased to Turkish Airline Cargo.
The Airbus freighter A-330F is suitable for regional operations, mainly, to China, India and Southeast Asia ( Vietnam and Indonesia).
"However, we are still looking for partners on the block-space arrangement, entailing the leased aircraft of another airline.
"We are looking at building up traffic from Kuala Lumpur via Central Asia to Amsterdam.
"We have been serving the Dutch market for a number of years, with Amsterdam serving as our hub in Europe," Ahmed Luqman said.
MASKargo handled 398,722 tonnes of cargo in 2015, down eight per cent from the 434,793 tonnes in 2014, resulting from a reduction in cargo capacity transported in the aircraft belly.
While MASKargo's focus has essentially, been on regional markets, it uses "blocked space" for its international traffic by using other airlines.
Ahmed Luqman revealed that it was negotiating with Emirates, the Dubai-based carrier, for the bellyhold cargo and highlighted the significance of India as a market.
"China and India are inter-related. We see strong demand for cargo from China into India, particularly in segments such as electronics and e-Commerce.
"This will be the case with outbound cargo from China.But in the case of similar cargo from India, we see good potential in pharmaceuticals, chemicals and transportation of dangerous products which are not permitted for transport in the belly of passenger aircraft," he said.
He said India supplied pharmaceutical products to the rest of the world, and this comes with tremendous business potential for cargo carriers.
MASKargo operates freighter flights to Chennai and Bangalore on a twice weekly basis.
"We are looking into the possibility of adding another destination of either Mumbai or Delhi in our future operations.
"This could be possibly decided by the third quarter of the year," Luqman added.
He identified Asia, Europe and Australia as the carrier's markets.
Meanwhile, German carrier Lufthansa intends to discontinue its daily service to Kuala Lumpur effective end-March, according to Dr Alexis von Hoensbroech, a member of the executive board of Lufthansa Cargo (product and sales).
He said this on the sidelines of the Air Cargo India 2016.
Source: Bernama | 27 Feb. 2016
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