China's air cargo industry has been growing steadily during the recent years, but the domestic carriers are still much weaker than foreign rivals and most of the market has been dominated by overseas companies. This was the view forwarded by experts attending the recently held 6th China Air Cargo Summit, according to Xinhua's report.

Sha Hongjiang, vice director of department of planning and development of the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC), said most Chinese airports have registered growth in cargo volume while freighter capacity and utilization rates are rising, but overseas carriers' market dominance has become an important problem.

The gap between the volume of cargo carried by domestic and overseas carriers has grown in the recent years, said Mr Sha. Foreign carriers accounted for 87 per cent of Shanghai Pudong Airport's international freight volume last year.

Mr Sha also noted that the frequency and utilization of cargo flights of domestic carriers are much lower than their rivals.

Li Yang, director of industry distribution and financial services of International Air Transport Association (IATA) North Asia, said the air cargo transport is a chain of services covering from picking up to delivering. The domestic carriers are far behind the foreign ones in their network and value-added services.

CAAC has launched 10 measures to propel the development of airfreight industry, including encouraging cargo fleet expansion and establishment of private carriers.

Source: Hongkong Shipping Gazette