There have been about 50 flights a day of passenger planes filled only with freight leaving and arriving in Australia over the past week, according to the Federal Government.
Passenger aircrafts that fly only with cargo, referred to as “ghost flights”, are keeping airlines and Australian airports afloat.
Qantas is operating 15 international return flights a week with 787 and A330 passenger aircrafts, previously transporting travellers, are now carrying only freight.
Alan Joyce, Qantas chief executive said that on some days, the freighters have been as busy as during the peak Christmas period due to people ordering goods online for home delivery.
Before the global pandemic, 80 per cent of air cargo was carried in the belly of international passenger jets. When international travel was shut down, so too was 80 per cent of the available cargo space.
In early April the Federal Government announced the International Freight Assistance Mechanism, a $110 million freight scheme managed by Austrade.
The mechanism is primarily intended to protect key export markets by way of a freight subsidy to high-value agricultural and fisheries products.
According to figures by the Freight and Trade Alliance (FTA), as of last week, the International Freight Assistance Mechanism had supported over 250 flights to key international destinations.
These international flights carried over 7,500 tonnes of high value agricultural exports.
Sal Milici, Head of Border and Biosecurity at FTA, said the industry has seen a stabilisation of the air cargo market.
“This has been achieved largely by the supply chain sector effectively communicating and sharing detail of air cargo capacity leading to an increase of freighter services and also a number of cargo only flights,” he said.
“Costs are understandably higher than normal without the financial offset of a passenger movements. However, what was shaping up as a disaster for the industry in mid-March, has evolved into an amazing good news story,
“We have been able to keep the air cargo sector alive through the collaborative efforts of industry and government.’
Gert-Jan de Graaff, Brisbane Airport’s chief executive, told AFR that if it wasn’t for a handful of airline partners keeping freight pathways open for Queensland producers, the situation would be even more dire.
At Brisbane Airport, where freight volumes are down 90 per cent on the 10,000 tonnes that were moved in and out in April 2019, there are 40 flights each month of planes carrying only freight.
Sal said Air Canada had upgraded its Sydney-Toronto cargo 787-9 service, which is flying three times a week, to a bigger 777-300 aircraft due to strong demand.
“A return to normal levels of stability in service and rates would appear to be at least 12 months away,” he said.
“Industry and government have worked together to keep freight moving and all important export markets serviced.”
Meanwhile, at Shanghai Pudong International Airport, China, the volume of hospital gear, resumption of e-commerce and other trade following China’s coronavirus quarantine and new export restrictions are creating gridlock.
“In my 20 years, I have never experienced this level of congestion at any airport. And there are no signs of this alleviating in the next week to 10 days,” especially with factories reopening again, Neel Jones Shah, the global head of airfreight at San Francisco-based Flexport, said in an interview.
The Shanghai airport handled about 350 cargo flights during the last 10 days of April alone, Glyn Hughes, who heads the cargo division at the International Air Transport Association, told FreightWaves.
Freight Forwarder Agility said that the airport is taking some action to try and reduce waiting times.
Agility also reported that airfreight capacity out of China is up 6 per cent compared with a year ago.
The freight forwarder also reported that Chinese airlines are restricted to only flying one route per week to/from China to all other countries. Foreign carriers may only fly to China once a week, irrespective of the origin point.