Global air cargo demand is still going strong into the holiday season, although growth rates are thinning compared to the summer months.
According to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), total demand, measured in cargo tonne-kilometers (CTKs), rose by 9.4 percent compared to September 2023 levels. On a seasonally adjusted basis, industry CTKs fell for the second consecutive month by 0.4 percent.
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The month broke a streak of nine straight months of double-digit annual demand growth that started in December 2023.
International routes keep pushing up global cargo demand, with a 10.5 percent year-over-year increase in CTKs in September. Airlines are benefiting from rising e-commerce demand in the U.S. and Europe amid ongoing capacity limits in ocean shipping, the association said.
For the sixth consecutive month, the largest contributors to the annual demand surge were carriers from Asia Pacific and Europe, which contributed 42 percent and 26 percent to the global increase in CTKs.
Although retailers had pulled cargo orders forward during the summer ahead of the East and Gulf Coast port dockworkers strike, resulting in an earlier peak shipping season, the work stoppage didn’t appear to spur a major shift to air freight in the weeks prior.
However, air freight and ocean freight benchmarking platform Xeneta pointed out that the strike impacted volumes during and after the strike took place.
“Europe to North America saw the largest month-on-month volume increase of 11 percent [in October.] The return leg also saw a 10 percent month-on-month increase as shippers and forwarders took precautionary measures to lessen the impact of the three-day strike by dockworkers at U.S. East Coast and Gulf Coast ports,” according to Thursday press release from Xeneta. “A quicker-than-expected resolution to this industrial action, however, saw the positive impact of the strike on air cargo volumes ebb away after reaching a peak in the week ending Oct. 20. Nonetheless, the rise in this corridor’s air cargo rates is likely to continue after airlines reduced cargo capacity at the end of the month to mark the start of winter schedules.”
The IATA said limited ocean carrier capacity and rising ocean freight costs, both brought on by ongoing container ship diversions away from the Red Sea, were two likely drivers of companies transitioning from sea to air.