The Asia-Pacific (APAC) region has enjoyed significant growth in airfreight, benefiting from a year of relative stability compared to the uncertainty seen in Europe and the Middle East. The revival of tourism, increased business travel, and a rising middle class have all contributed to this boom, creating a natural demand for goods and services. In addition, substantial infrastructure investments across key APAC economies have supported growth in both manufacturing and shipping.

There’s potential for narrow-body freighters to operate within the region, connecting short-haul destinations and transporting e-commerce goods, perishables, and industrial products. Additionally, the industry is seeing new collaborations between smaller regional airfreight companies and more established airlines, as demonstrated by recent developments in China, Malaysia, and Vietnam. Teleport is a prime example of such progress.

“The economic prospect in the long term in the APAC region is very positive. Demand for overall air cargo will remain strong throughout 2024 untill 2025 for reasons as I stated above,” Siddharth Sinha, CEO of SinoGlobal Logisitcs, said.

“Bigger corporations in the industry will continue to keep investing in research and development to look at industrial growth, sectors that they can focus on, hedging space and forging partnerships with airlines for long- term contracts.

“Small and medium airfreight operators can play a key role and help themselves to a robust growth if they find a niche product or lane to work on. After all, the US$150 billion industry is managed not only by a handful of operators.

“Manufacturing growth across Asian economies including China, India and Vietnam, along with the e-commerce boom and disruptions of sea freight in the Red Sea will continue to offer opportunities to local/ regional/smaller operations as well.

“The future in the short-term looks good and very secure in the long-term.”

Digital connections

Digitalisation has been widely touted as a key driver of efficiency in logistics, but industry experts argue that it’s still in its infancy. While some airlines and forwarders offer online booking, quotes, and cargo tracking, these tools are seen as basic rather than transformative.

To achieve true efficiency in logistics operations, the industry needs to embrace technology at a faster pace and invest both time and resources into it. Currently, most solutions in the industry are not AI-powered because the global infrastructure isn’t fully interconnected. As a result, opportunities, solutions, and services are still largely managed by people rather than automated systems.

“If we set aside the top 25 forwarders of the world, we still have thousands small and medium companies who manage the most of the cargo movement around the world,” Sinha stated.

“As for airlines, the whole digitalisation process is not far too different… Just offering online bookings, quotes or tracking of cargo by individual service providers is nothing but just a feel-good factor talk.

“None of the digitalisation tools are comprehensive solution to end users. Customers are still dependent on personal contacts across industry and that gap needs to be bridged.

“Digitalisation is the future and stake holders have to come onboard together to make air cargo and logistics as a whole more transparent for the consumers.”

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