DHL Adds Capacity between North Asia and Europe

DHL Global Forwarding, a provider of air and ocean freight carriage services, is securing additional capacity from commercial carriers to avoid capacity constraints between North Asia and Europe throughout the first quarter of 2010. In November and December 2009, the global airfreight industry faced a strong increase in demand for transportation space, which contributed to backlogs of goods shipped from China to Europe. This resulted in steep increases in freight rates.

“In order to mitigate the shortage of space we will be securing extra capacity from commercial carriers on our trade lanes between North Asia and Europe throughout the first quarter of 2010”, says Thomas Nieszner, CEO Europe/CEE DHL Global Forwarding. “We are working very closely with our customers on capacity planning to ensure their supply chains are stable and our delivery times are fast.”

It appears that transportation capacity constraints will continue as a number of airlines are reluctant to increase cargo uplift capacity, which was reduced due to the global economic downturn. The reason behind this is the high cost of reactivating the temporarily grounded aircraft.

While the demand for air freight space traditionally decreases after the year-end holiday causing freight rates to drop significantly, the current capacity outlook and latest customer forecasts for the first quarter of 2010 indicate a continuation of airfreight capacity constraints on the North Asia to Europe trade lanes. Airfreight out of China, Hong Kong, Korea and Taiwan is in particularly high demand, with the next peak expected to occur before the Chinese New Year in February, anticipating the factory closures during the holidays.