Newsletter – January 12, 2023

AIR FREIGHT UPDATES

U.S. air travel outage hits Canadian transborder flights: Airlines

bnnbloomberg.ca
Some transborder flights with Canadian airlines were impacted Wednesday when the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) temporarily grounded all domestic routes due to a major computer outage.
The number of affected Canadian airline flights wasn’t immediately known after routes resumed mid-morning. The FAA lifted the ground stop shortly before 9 a.m. EST as it probed the source of the issue, though service impacts continued to ripple through airports across the U.S. Read more here.

Asia-Pacific Airlines Carry 7 Times More Passengers Year-On-Year

simpleflying.com
As countries around the region continue to relax their travel restrictions, Asia-Pacific has experienced significant year-on-year growth in international passenger numbers.
According to the latest data from the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines (AAPA), the region saw 13.4 million international passengers in November 2022. This figure was over seven times higher than in November 2021, when just 1.8 million passengers took to the skies. Read more here.

No signs of Chinese New Year rise in air cargo demand

aircargonews.net
Any hopes of a surge in air cargo demand ahead of the Chinese New Year/Lunar New Year holiday appear to have faded as economic pressures continue to put the breaks on consumer spending.
The two-week holiday this year falls on January 22 but industry players are not expecting to see the usual increase in demand as factories close for the two-week holiday. Read more here.

Air Canada Cargo’s freighter frenzy

aircargonews.net
For an airline that stripped itself of maindeck passenger-cargo combination aircraft and freighters in the 1990s, Air Canada is certainly now making up for lost time.
The airline’s current freighter order book represents a hefty financial investment. Read more here.

OCEAN FREIGHT UPDATES

GCT Canada: New Process for Empty Returns at Vancouver Terminals

ciffa.com
Effective January 16, all empty receiving at GCT Deltaport and GCT Vanterm will be secured by appointment via GCT Canada’s online appointment system. This will replace bulk appointments (i.e., mass creates), and Excel documents will no longer be required by Operations Support.
Empty-return reservations will be available only after volume quotas have been set between the ocean carrier and GCT Canada. Trucking companies are asked to strictly follow the volumes advised to them by the ocean carriers.
Trucking companies attempting to secure empty return reservations that have not been approved by the terminal will receive the following error message: Err:  The Line Op has not been approved for this shift.
This new process should help streamline the movement of empties to GCT terminals and allow trucking companies to increase velocity of empties through the terminal.

Maritime tech disappointments in 2023

splash247.com
Shipping is regularly lambasted for its lack of innovative spirit. As regular writers of annual tech previews – see last year’s version here – the disparity between stated ambition and actual developments can be enormous.
Splash columnist Kris Kosmala argues that maritime is full of technology improvements of which a few could be called innovations, but he says he would be hard pressed to name a true breakthrough in 2022. Read more here.

INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS – GOVERNMENT UPDATES

New ‘five-year plan’ to revive China as a modern logistics giant

theloadstar.com
Increased demand has exposed cracks in China’s logistics infrastructure, but it’s hoping its new ‘five-year plan’ for the sector may be enough to stop an expected exodus of western multinationals.
The General Office of the State Council last month announced its first long-term plan for modernising China’s logistics system, with a focus on improving efficiency resilience and safety. Read more here (login required).