Finnair plans cargo freighter service to India

NEW DELHI - Nordic carrier Finnair plans to launch a full-fledged freighter service between Helsinki and Mumbai next year after seeing its cargo volumes grow quite impressively from India in recent years, despite the global slowdown.

The airline, which operates scheduled passenger services six-days-a-week between New Delhi and Helsinki, sees itself as an ideal cargo carrier out of India to serve both northern Europe and some member countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).

“Our experience so far with cargo out of New Delhi has been encouraging. We have space for at least 20 tonnes of cargo in each scheduled passenger flight, and that is being utilised quite well,” said Kuldip Singh Kharayat, area director for Finnair Cargo.

“It is for this reason that we managed to carry 5.4 percent higher volumes from New Delhi last year, despite a 16 percent cut in capacity. This year, so far, our volumes have grown 26 percent,” Kharayat, who overseas the Indian subcontinent, told IANS.

“The same was the case when we were operating scheduled passenger flights from Helsinki to Mumbai. So we are planning to start Finnair Cargo service to the city from next year and the finer details and logistics of the freighter service are being analysed.”

Kharayat said there was a huge potential to fly merchandise such as garments, footwear, leather accessories and pharmaceuticals from Mumbai to Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and some CIS countries. These are the main items of Indian exports to the region.

On the return leg, Finnair Cargo already sees high volumes and further potential for telecom and electronic goods and equipment.

“If you consider Helsinki as a hub, we have the shortest flying distance from India to northern Europe. So it makes sense to fly your cargo on Finnair as we also have a very good onward connectivity — by road, sea and air,” Kharayat said.

According to data available with the carrier, the overall cargo tonnage it carried grew 34 percent from January to June mainly due to the Asian market and induction of its own cargo aircraft traffic in May.

“Our assessment is that India has the potential to become a global air cargo hub due to its geographical location and impressive economic growth. This will require developing gateways, cost-effective handling and simplifying customs procedures,” Kharayat said.