The International Air Transport Association (IATA) said 2020 was the "worst year" for air cargo demand since its performance monitoring commenced in 1990 dragged by lockdowns and capacity crunch.
The airline association reported a year-on-year decrease in air cargo demand, measured in cargo tonne-km (CTKs), of 10.6% — the largest year-on-year drop since its records began. It includes an 11.8% drop for international operations outpacing the 6% overall decline in global trade.
Industry-wide capacity, measured in available cargo tonne km (ACTKs), also decreased 23.3%.
It said improvements were recorded towards the end of 2020, however, capacity remained down 17.7%, indicating the continuing severe capacity crunch.
IATA noted that the decline in air cargo’s performance last year was due to the global lockdowns in the first few months of the year, which disrupted airfreight supply chains until around May.
But since then, IATA said “this recovery has continued until the year-end, despite some volatility when renewed Covid outbreaks forced some markets to implement new restrictions.”
IATA noted that freighter operations and making use of preighters to transport cargo were “unable to fully compensate the lack of belly capacity.”
“This effect is arguably the main culprit for the underperformance of airfreight, and offsets positive factors such as the need to turn to air travel for PPE and vaccine shipments,” it said.
Due to the lack of capacity, load factor increased 7.7%, contributing to increased yields and revenues that supported airlines and some long haul passenger services in the face of collapsed passenger revenues.
Conditions improving but this year will remain tough
IATA said economic conditions are picking up in 2021.
"Air cargo is surviving the crisis in better shape than the passenger side of the business. For many airlines, 2020 saw air cargo become a vital source of revenues, despite weakened demand. But with much of the passenger fleet grounded, meeting demand without belly capacity continues to be an enormous challenge," said IATA director general and CEO Alexandre de Juniac.
"As countries strengthen travel restrictions in the face of new coronavirus variants, it is difficult to see improvements in passenger demand or the capacity crunch. 2021 will be another tough year," he added.
Only North America, Africa posted demand gains
Meanwhile, looking at regional performance, IATA said only North American and African carriers reported an annual gain in demand in 2020, while all other regions remained in negative territory compared to 2019 — citing strong variations evident in the regional performance of air cargo last year.
