Taking issue with the subject of the second session of day two of Air Freight Asia, Jim Edgar, regional director cargo marketing for Boeing said the question was not “To feed or not to feed” but “how will we feed, becausefeed is already taking place”.
Pointing to average intra-Asian growth of 10.8 per cent per annum for the past 20 years, he said Boeing continued to predict 8.6 per cent growth for the next 20 years. But he added that the bulk of that feed would continue to come from bellyhold cargo or the regional use of wide-body freighters, rather than from dedicatedregional freighters.
One exception to this was express carriers, who operated 75 per cent of the medium wide-body freighter fl eet at present. These operated a hub and spoke system, with common transfer platforms and no need for rebuilding pallets. But regional freighter penetration had been very limited in general cargo, and was likely to continue sofor several reasons, Edgar said.
For one thing, general cargo carriers had a mix of hub and spoke feeder needs and point-to-point regional services. For another, they made extensive use of large wide-body aircrafton regional passenger routes.
For example, a 747-400 with a full passenger load on an Asian regional route had 27.7 tonnes of bellyhold capacity, equivalent to 72 per cent of a 757-200 freighter. Analysing the top ten city pairs for intra-regional traffi c in Asia, this produced an impressiveamount of belly capacity.
For example from Hong Kong to Taipei there was belly capacity equivalent to 185 767-300F freighter loads a week, while from China to Tokyo Narita it was 86 freighter loads and from China to Seoul Incheon 79loads.
“Over 60 percent of intra-Asian cargo is carried on passenger planes in this way,” Edgar added, “and there is also the maindeck capacity on 747-400 freighters used on regional legs.”
He conceded that some Asian carriers– among them ANA, Asiana, JapanAirlines, Air Hong Kong, Air Macauand Korean Air – had deployed either767-300 or A300-600 freighters, butreckoned these would remain a relativelysmall part of regional capacity.
Where regional freighters were added to the Asian fl eet in the next 20 years, Boeing expected 77 per cent of them to be conversions, with most deployed in China. But these would continue to be dwarfed by the number of large freighter deliveries – in stark contrast to Europe and North America, where the balance between large and medium freighter deliverieswould be more equal.
Edgar fi nished by reviewing Boeing’s offerings in the regional freighter sector – the 767-300 production freighter, the 767-300 conversion andthe 767-200 conversion.
He conceded that compared to the rival A300-600F, the 767 had 11.4 tonnes less revenue payload, but pointed out that the Airbus had an empty operational weight 26.5 tonnes higher. “So you are carrying nearly 27 tonnes extra weight for that extra 11.4 tonnes payload,” he pointed out. This had an impact on operating economics, with the 767-300 offering 10 per cent lower trip costs.
Meanwhile, the latest Airbus freighter offering, the A330-200F only offered 4 per cent better tonne mile costs at best, and its extra range was of little use in Asian regional markets.“We have customer data on the 767-300 and they are telling us that theydon’t approach the limit of its range,”Edgar said.