Air Freight Situation in Bangladesh
Since last two months, Hazarat Shahjalal International Airport in Dhaka is struggling to cope with the huge demand of Air Freight from Bangladesh. The situation has not improved and an unprecedented backlog can now be seen. The demand in air freight has raised not only because of customers trying to avoid congestion at transshipment ports but also due to the need of refilling the inventory levels to meet upcoming Christmas and Winter demand. Suppliers are also being pushed to move shipments by air freight to meet arrival deadlines and avoid order cancellations.
Amongst other issues, there is a lack of space to accommodate the additional volumes and mismanagement by the various authorities working there. At present. the airport is handling 1.5 times more cargo than its capacity. The construction work of the new Terminal 3 has reduced space for vehicle movements as they cannot unload the cargo on-time to catch the scheduled flight. Long truck queues can be seen as it is taking 2-3 days to unload the cargo.
Higher cargo shipping charges are also pushing the buyers and exporters to use air freights, but issues with HSIA’s scanners and weighing scales is making it very difficult to handle the extra load. Scanning of cargo specially is a major concern as six machines, out of which many are out of order, are not sufficient for screening of regular volumes.
In absence of ULD scanning machines, individual boxes are scanned, which takes a long time to complete. Same situation can be found in RA3 scanning areas where the EDS (Explosive Detection System) machine is out of order and all these issues leads to forwarders being unable to load cargo on the aircraft on time. As a result freight forwarders are missing booking and shippers are facing cancellations for failing to meet deadlines.
As forwarders struggle to get goods uplifted, scheduled flights are flying under capacity and to get another booking promptly and at the same rate becomes impossible, leading to another 8-10 days delay.
Airlines have consequently increased rates and it is now almost double compared to previous months. Even paying that rate does not ensure a regular transit-time and waiting for uplift has reached 10-15 days.
Bangladesh Garments Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) Vice President Shahidullah Azim said, “Many of our buyers are asking to send their goods through air freight as their stores are almost empty due to the pandemic. On the other hand, the cargo shipping charge has increased up to 400% depending on destination. The apparel makers have secured a big number of work orders for the coming days which may increase the pressure further.”
Apparel exporters have raised their voice against shortage of capacity and inadequate resources at HSIA as they are trying to ship goods through air freight due to time shortage. If these goods are shipped by sea, they buyers might miss this season. But now they are facing the same concern with air freight as well.
BGMEA requests the government to improve cargo handling service
BGMEA leaders led by Vice-President Md Nasir Uddin met the honorable State Minister for Civil Aviation and Tourism Md. Mahbub Ali to discuss about the current situation at the Airport.
The BGMEA leaders requested the minister to take necessary measures for improving the cargo handling processes at Hazarat Shahjalal International Airport (HSIA) as ready-made garments manufacturers are facing serious challenges in uplifting their cargo and meet deadlines.
Increasing the number of Explosive Detection Scanners (EDS) were the main point raised by the BGMEA leaders along with maintenance of the existing EDS systems on regular basis.
Air Freight is an important factor in modern supply chain. If Bangladesh wants to meet the export target they have set for themselves, they need to give serious consideration on improving the ground handling services at HSIA. There have already been suggestions made by some customers to use alternative airports such as Kolkata in India, but that will only increase the cost of doing business for the suppliers.
N2N Sourcing continues to monitor the situation and with a robust freight management process, assisting the customers to manage their air freight out of Bangladesh in an efficient manner.
