Hong Kong International Airport (HKIA) continued to post recovery in air cargo volumes, with August numbers showing both year-on-year and month-on-month increases.

The world's busiest cargo hub handled 367,000 tonnes of cargo in August — up 1.7%, while flight movements recorded a month-on-month increase of 4.3% to 25,055 movements.

Cargo throughput in August increased by 8.5% on a year-on-year basis, with a 20.5% surge in export volume compared to the same month last year.

The Airport Authority Hong Kong (AAHK) said in a statement that traffic to and from key trading regions in the Middle East, Europe, and North America saw the most significant increases.

Over the first eight months of the year, HKIA handled 167,895 flight movements, representing 97.4% year-on-year growth.

Cargo volume decreased slightly by 2.6% year-on-year to over 2.7 million tonnes.

On a 12-month rolling basis,  cargo throughput saw a decrease of 11.8% to 4.1 million tonnes.

In July, air cargo volumes at HKIA increased boosted by export expansion in the city — marking the first year-on-year growth in air freight at the world's busiest cargo hub. 

HKIA saw air cargo throughput grow 3.8% year-on-year to 361,000 tonnes in July. This is also 1.7% higher than the 355,000 tonnes that the airport handled in June.