Freight expectations for Somali cargo sector

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While impressive strides have been taken to rehabilitate and grow its economy, Somalia will be heavily dependent on imports for many years to come. That makes cargo a lifeline for the country, bringing humanitarian aid, perishable food and reconstruction materials into the Horn of Africa from around the world.

Kenya’s Astral Aviation is by far the largest player in the Somali air cargo market, having launched scheduled once-weekly flights from Nairobi to Mogadishu in 2012 with a Boeing McDonnell-Douglas DC-9 freighter capable of carrying 15 tonnes. A second frequency was added last year, and chief executive Sanjeev Gadhia expects a third flight to begin in November alongside a new scheduled link to Hargeisa...

Airlines pledge to cough up for cross-border flight pollution

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Civil aviation accounts for perhaps only 2% of man-made carbon emissions today. Add in other pollutants, such as nitrous oxide, and its contribution to climate change might be twice that figure. That may not seem much, but the sector is expanding rapidly. Since the 1970s, global air traffic has doubled in size about every 15 years. Rising prosperity in developing countries and massive backlogs of aircraft orders mean that the industry's contrails will continue growing for decades. Without regulation, the world’s airlines will quickly choke its skies...

Interview: Jérôme Maillet Congo Airways Deputy CEO

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Last December, an Airbus A310 freighter ploughed into houses after overshooting the runway at Mbuji-Mayi Airport in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Eight people lost their lives. The disaster came barely four months after loose tarmac slabs on the same runway damaged the stabiliser of a departing Boeing 737-300 passenger jet.

Unfortunately for regular travellers in Africa’s second largest country, incidents such as these are hardly uncommon. The Aviation Safety Network has recorded 24 aircraft crashes in DRC since the turn of the decade, resulting in 167 fatalities. The grim track-record has earned the country a spot in Annex A of the European Union’s aviation blacklist, meaning that all locally-registered airlines are banned from entering EU airspace.

It is precisely because of this worrying background that Air France Consulting agreed to help the Congolese government set up a new flag-carrier – one that would abide by European standards and start mending the country’s tainted reputation for air safety...

Interview: Karam Chand, Royal Brunei Airlines CEO

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Royal Brunei Airlines, the flag-carrier of the tiny sultanate of Brunei, is cautiously returning to growth after completing a five-year restructuring plan led by former chief executive Dermot Mannion.

The new roadmap will see Royal Brunei launch services to the Indian subcontinent, while also expanding in North Asia and potentially up-gauging its short-haul fleet.

It will be implemented by Karam Chand, the airline’s new chief executive, who took over from Mannion in March after serving as chief commercial and planning officer for four years. Speaking to Routes News during the IATA AGM in Dublin, Chand credited his predecessor with putting the flag-carrier on a new, more sustainable path...

Air Djibouti cargo strategy on hold amid logistics security concerns

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Air Djibouti is temporarily shifting its focus to passenger operations until air cargo facilities in the Horn of Africa nation are improved, commercial director Ian Patrick tells Loadstar.

The state-owned flag-carrier had launched services in August 2015 with a Fokker 27 freighter, kick-starting the government’s plan to develop a combined sea and air logistics hub. Djibouti is located by the strategically important Bab al-Mandab shipping lane that connects the Red Sea with the Gulf of Aden.

Flights were grounded between November 2015 and August 2016 following the withdrawal of the Fokker, but have now resumed with a Boeing 737-400 passenger jet wet-leased from VVB Aviation Malta. The next three aircraft will also be passenger jets, Patrick confirmed...

British Airways: To fly, to scrooge

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Back in the 1990s, British Airways, the nation’s flag-carrier, proclaimed itself to be “The World’s Favourite Airline” in a long-running and hugely successful advertising campaign. Watching its iconic TV commercials from sofas across the country, many Brits—a pint-sized, starry-eyed Gulliver among them—swelled with pride at what was, at the time, a genuinely treasured national asset. Were British Airways to run the same campaign today, it would probably stir a mixture of derision abroad and embarrassment at home...

Iran Air's dealmaker

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While everyone expected that the lifting of nuclear sanctions against Iran would unleash a flurry of deal-making, the scale of the ambitions laid out by flag-carrier Iran Air in January took many observers by surprise.

Within a fortnight of the implementation of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) – an international agreement that lifts sweeping embargoes against the country – Transport Minister Abbas Akhoundi had announced a heads-of-agreement between Iran Air and Airbus for 118 aircraft. A parallel deal with ATR covered up to 40 turboprops for the flag-carrier.

In June, yet another memorandum to buy 80 aircraft from Boeing brought Iran Air’s provisional orderbook to a jaw-dropping 238 planes – nearly ten times the number it deploys today...

Interview: Saeed Kalhori, Kish Air Deputy Managing Director

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Kish Island – pronounced "quiche" – has been a focal point for Iranian aviation since the 1970s, when Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the last Shah of Iran, transformed the desolate Gulf island into a luxury casino and vacation resort.

Its small airport was specifically designed to handle the supersonic Concorde, which whisked foreign dignitaries in from Paris under a wet-lease agreement with Iran Air.

Much like the flag-carrier's own order for Concordes, however, the debauchery came to an end with the 1979 Islamic Revolution that deposed the Shah and introduced more conservative values across the country. Kish now adheres to the same religious codes that govern the rest of Iran – alcohol is forbidden; hijabs are mandatory for females.

The island forged a new path in the 1980s by becoming one of Iran's free-trade zones. Governing body the Kish Free Zone Organisation (KFZO) now woos overseas investors with the promise of visa-free travel; 15-year tax exemptions; and no restrictions on foreign ownership.

Its overarching plan is to transform Kish into "the next Dubai" – an oasis for business and high-end tourism in the Persian Gulf...

Interview: Mahmoud Shekarabi, Qeshm Air CEO

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Qeshm Island, like its smaller but better-known neighbour Kish Island, doesn't feature in the travel bucket-lists of many international tourists.

Of the 397,000 people who flew to the island in the Strait of Hormuz last year, three quarters were Iranian nationals.

Qeshm's Dayrestan Airport ranks as only the 13th largest gateway in Iran by aircraft movements, despite being the main entry point for one of the country's much-touted free-trade zones. No foreign carriers fly there on a regular basis.

"Our customers are Iranian tourists mostly," confirmed Mahmoud Shekarabi, chief executive of Qeshm Air, the airline that provides two-thirds of seating capacity at the island. "Due to the sanctions there were some problems for businessmen to fly here [in the past].

"But I believe there's going to be changes. Before, there was tourism and just maybe some students. Now it's going to be businessmen, students, tourists, families...

Meraj shrugs off sanctions

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The lifting of nuclear-related sanctions against Iran may be a watershed moment for the country's civil aviation sector, but not all domestic operators are seeing immediate benefits.

Meraj Airlines, along with Mahan Air and Caspian Airlines, continues to be shackled by terrorism-related sanctions – a handicap that stems from its alleged support for Iranian military activity in Syria.

The company was founded in 2010 and partly functions as a scheduled passenger airline, deploying three Airbus A320s and two A300-600s from Tehran, Mashhad and Kish.

But it also operates VIP flights on behalf of the Iranian Government with a mixed fleet of A320-family jets, A340s, Boeing 737-200s, 707-300s and Falcon 50s. It is this facilitating role for the Government that has aroused the concern of the US Treasury, which accuses Meraj of ferrying "illicit cargo, including weapons" to the Syrian regime...