The upcoming festivities in China, Mid-Autumn Festival from 15 to 17 September & National Day from 1 to 7 October, will undoubtedly lead to new tensions in logistics from China.
One of the consequences of the Houthi attacks in the Bab el Mandeb strait has been an increase in demand for air services. Air cargo spot rates soared in August as demand and capacity imbalances continued, accompanied by additional demand related to e-commerce and shipping disruptions in the Red Sea
Average spot rates showed their highest year-on-year growth of 24%, according to Xeneta’s latest monthly analysis. Here is a link to a news item commenting on this issue: aircargonews.net/data/peak-practise-as-august-air-cargo-spot-rates-up-nearly-25/
Therefore, the various analyses suggest a strong demand for capacity especially in air transport affecting the main corridors. Some of the main factors are:
- Supply/demand gap. Global freight supply grew at its slowest pace in 2024 to date, by 2% year-on-year, while global freight demand continued its double-digit growth, increasing by 11%.
- Increased demand for commercial campaigns such as Black Friday and Christmas.
- Increased requests for premium air contracts to secure space from certain customers.
- Circumnavigation of Africa, which results in an average increase in sea transit between the Far East and Europe of 15-20 days. Therefore, cargo shipped after September will have very tight transits for the Christmas campaign, with the risk of late arrivals.
- Possible backlogs on main corridors (shortage of space due to high demand) resulting in delays of several days in planned departures and connections on air routes.
Having said all this, it is very important for a proper control of the supply of goods to take into account the upcoming festivities in China Mid-Autumn Festival from 15 to 17 September and National Day from 1 to 7 October. We recommend that all maritime cargo that must arrive to attend the Christmas campaign is coordinated to be shipped before October 1st, otherwise, we would find intermediate logistical solutions such as rail transport via Central Europe, for example, or, ultimately, air transport.
From BestWay we remain at your disposal to analyse your logistical needs, offering various alternatives for each operation, analysing transits, routes and costs for your international movements.
*This article has been automatically translated from its Spanish version.
