“There are hardly any exports,” explains Tilmann Gabriel why almost nothing is flown out of the country, except for many personal effects and sniffing dogs that head back home from their drug finding duties to relax for a while in a more tranquil environment.

Gabriel, the long-time executive of Lufthansa who is now sitting in the driver’s seat of small Dubai-based, Afghan carrier Safi Airways, which will soon move over from Dubai to Kabul to head the private enterprise once the carrier’s new headquarters is ready.

“It’s a pity,” he laments, that cargo up to this point is nothing more than oneway traffic into Afghanistan. “They’ve got fertile land, crops, grapes, beautiful roses, vegetables and fruits,” Gabriel states. But these perishables, he regrets, are rotten before they make it to the airport. It’s the lack of cool room equipped warehouses, extremely poor road conditions that make surface transports incalculable. On top of that there are three different security layers around Kabul airport where every single piece of air freight is examined many times by the guards.

“Eventually it can take up to a week before the piece can be flown out,” says Tom De Geytere, Safi’s CFO, who is also in charge of developing the cargo business. As things stand, “selling exportsout of Kabul is practically impossible under the given circumstances, butremains as challenge and vision on ouragenda”, says the Belgian-born manager.“As soon as there are the first positivesigns for two-way traffic we intend toestablish our own sales organisation inKabul,” he says.

As far as imports into Afghanistan are concerned Safi intends to hand over the entire air freight business to a sole sales agent. The only exception are the Frankfurt services where agent Mueller + Partner and their subcontractor Aircargonet remain responsible for filling the bellies of the carrier’s passenger fleet – two Boeing 737-300s and one Boeing 767-200ER – with shipments. “From the Frankfurt flights we expect a substantial contribution to our revenue by the cargo business,” says Claus Fischer, Safi’s chief commercial officer.

Acc rding to Aircargonet just about everything is flown to Kabul, be it consumer goods, machiner y parts, medical instruments, automotive parts or supplies for the armed forces and the many civil foreign servants working there . “Frankfurt – Kabul is a highly interesting connection but it needs expertise to be successful on thisspecific trade lane and get access to this complicated market,”Aircargonet’s managing director KlausLederer emphasises.

Big plans for Safi
One major difference between privately-owned Safi and their national competitors Ariana, KAM and Pamir Airways is the ICAO compliance Safi has achieved making it the first Afghan carrier to meet recognised international safety standards. The next step will be the IOSA audit that is supposed to happen this year, Fischer says.

“This will be our door opener, enabling charter flights for the United Nations and for carrying UN officials as well as diplomats and their goods. Members of the United Nations are only officially permitted to fly on board of IOSA audited airlines while pursuing their diplomatic missions,” he says.

Soon Safi’s fleet will be doubled bringing the total number of aircraft to six. Whether these will be Boeing or Airbus variants is undecided to this point. “We are in close negotiations with both manufacturers and will solve this topic very rapidly,” states CEO Gabriel. The plan includes the phasing out of the two ageing B737-300s and the B767 and their replacement by more modern equipment.

Once the new aircraft are added to Safi’s fleet the carrier will commence scheduled flights to Jeddah, Delhi, Beijing and Moscow. Domestic services within Afghanistan are not intended for the time being, confirms Gabriel. Talking with German aviation journalists in Hamburg recently Safi’s CEO revealed new thoughts. “We are planning to build a subsidiary in Dubai for offering commercial passenger flights out of there.”

He further announced that his airline intends to join IATA and eventually become a member of one of the major global airline alliances. This all might take between six and ten years, Gabriel estimates, depending on the political and economic stabilisation of TalibanterrorizedAfghanistan.