Dnata Cargo, the freight handling service provider at Dubai International Airport, is putting the brakes on part of its business because of capacity constraints in Dubai. The company is slowing the growth of its handling service for charter operators at its facilities at Dubai Airport Free Zone.
“The capacity at the moment is insufficient for us to take on more customers,” senior vice-president Jean-Pierre De Pauw told Emirates Business. “We are deliberately slowing down the growth of the freight charter service to enable us to effectively utilise our facilities.”
Dnata Cargo serves charter operators through its freight gates three and four but has been facing capacity issues due to increasing demand. The gates were built in the late 1990s specifically to serve charter operators from the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The CIS carriers’ most lucrative destinations then were Afghanistan and Iraq.
“An acute shortage of parking space for carriers at the airport is causing serious concerns,” said De Pauw. “When there are many planes in the queue it costs charter operators a lot of money in terms of hourly landing charges, which are not favourable to business.”
He said the growth of the service had outgrown Dnata’s initial estimates and the facilities could not cater for the increasing demand.
“We will not be taking on more customers for this service until we find spare capacity,” added De Pauw.
Dnata Cargo is experiencing an average 15 per cent growth through its other six freight gates, which still have capacity available. The handling capacity at freight gates one and five has doubled following investment in expansion programmes.
Out of the total 700,000 tonnes handled by Dnata Cargo every year the charter business contributes 80,000 tonnes – about 11.5 per cent of the total.
Cargo volumes grew by 18 per cent last year compared to 2006 but the company expects growth to slow to five per cent this year. The International Air Transport Association predicts that the global growth for airfreight in 2008 will fall to four percent compared to 4.5 per cent last year.
