Current challenges of air transportation

Have recent changes affected air cargo business in any positive way? In the next five articles we will have a closer look at the issues of transportation in today's international business. This week we will tackle with air transportation.

While the height of the global recession in 2008-2009 saw the airline industry facing unprecedented declines, the dramatic upturn that began in the 4th Quarter of 2009-driven by shipper needs to restock depleted inventory-only draws more attention to the air freight market's  volatility. At first glance, the news appears positive for the carriers. International Air Transport Association (IATA) projected
that for 2010, global demand for both passenger and cargo service  expand by 11 percent. IATA forecasted 2010 yields for cargo to grow 7.9 percent, sharply higher than the 4.5 percent previously projected. 

As of September, IATA now expects the airline industry worldwide to  generate net profits of $8.9 billion in 2010, up from its previous forecast of $2.5 billion. Certainly, current airline revenue figures
are resulted in wide swings in overall transportation costs, rates,  and on-time performance.

Carriers, particularly those with expansive global footprints and integrated networks, are better able to manage capacity effectively from a cost and an on-time performance perspective. UPS, for example,
has relationships with 300 carriers, an integrated network and freight  forwarder operations, and alternate routings respond to capacity  issues that leverage its dedicated transportation networks in North America and Europe.

"In addition, UPS continually monitors global transportation trends," says Scott Aubuchon, UPS marketing director of global air freight. "With global distribution and sourcing trends continually shifting to new and emerging markets, it is important to have timely, efficient, and cost-effective access to these markets." Volatility in rates continues to be an issue, one that air carriers don't generally like to discuss. However, Pradeep Kumar, senior vice president of cargo at Emirates SkyCargo, sees rates nearly back to pre-crisis levels. He believes this has stabilized airline yields. "Volumes, too, are back to good levels," says Kumar. "Inventories had depleted, so companies were restocking right up until August, which is traditionally a very quiet month in our industry." With all the replenishing of stock continuing, Kumar says that this August has been the best August Emirates has experienced in years. Beginning with the fourth quarter of 2009, Emirates witnessed an explosion in cargo demand from Asia, particularly to Europe and theUnited States, as well as to the Middle East and Africa. "This year bucked all past trends and the upturn continued," he says. "Consumer demand for Notebooks, iPads, plasma and LCD TVs, and mobile phones-which continues to be the mainstay of the traffic flow-was back with a vengeance." Counter to the IATA forecast, Emirates SkyCargo's Kumar predicts a positive outlook for 2011. "With the cyclical nature of this business, we have witnessed that after a great period of volume growth, things slow down for a while before the markets pick up again," Kumar says.

 

Global factors Currencies are another factor affecting the global air cargo business. The depreciation of the Eurozone currencies, coupled with the economic crises in Greece, Spain, and Portugal, will have an effect on imports into the traditionally large consumer market in Europe. Meanwhile, airfreight has been experiencing higher growth rates in emerging markets than it has in traditional markets such as the United States and the countries in Europe. Asia-Pacific airlines have been the major beneficiary of the very sharp rebound in cargo markets and revenues. China is the key driver with a 9.9 percent GDP growth rate driving exports. "From our point of view, China will

remain the main driver for air freight," says Michael Goentgens, Lufthansa Cargo spokesman. "This year we expect, again, a very strong peak season around Christmas on an even higher level than last year." According to Goentgens, Lufthansa Cargo is making certain it will offer its customers the capacity they need. "This will also include a significant number of charter flights that we organize together with Lufthansa Cargo Charter GmbH," he says.

Carriers around the globe are also responding to South America's rise in growth, although this market has always been important to U. S. passenger carriers American Airlines (AA) and Delta. "Our Latin
American division is our largest revenue generating division in our system," says Carmen Taylor, director of cargo sales for Miami, the Caribbean, and Latin America for AACargo. "This includes our
southbound and northbound business."

Like most airlines, AA has suffered from shrinking capacity due to the global economic slowdown. Some of its flights to the Caribbean, Central America, and the northern rim of South America ceased when the carrier retired 32 Airbus aircraft. "We have replaced those with 767-300 aircraft, and have also been adding aircraft," says Taylor.

Manufacturers in North America and Europe are taking a cautionary approach to business inventory rebuilding. With continued high unemployment, consumer spending at a stalemate, coupled with an end to government fiscal stimulus packages, they see the economy slowing again and the need for fewer goods. Manufacturers in other producing countries such as China are also taking more caution in ordering their production volumes. These concerns, as well as other financial factors, are contributing to a shortening of supply chains around the world.

Meanwhile, North American shippers who turned to ocean freight to save costs during the height of the economic slowdown are now using air to reduce possible overstocking. While this might be good news for companies operating main deck freighter aircraft, combination carrier airlines that haul cargo in the belly hold of their aircraft are still reluctant to add additional capacity. "Most of those decisions are based on passenger loads versus cargo needs," comments Mark Mohr, manager of product development and specialty sales for Continental Airlines Cargo. What's more, air freighter operators are reluctant to add capacity to avoid market oversupply, a move that would result in lower yields and the prospect of having to again mothball aircraft just taken out of storage. "Until consumers loosen their purse strings, the industry will adopt a wait-and-see approach," Mohr warns.

IATA indicates that since late last year, capacity has come back to the market at about the same pace as demand growth. Consequently, to meet demand, Cathay Pacific has reinstated its fleet of five 747-400 freighters it stored in California for 12 months. Lufthansa Cargo pulled the last of four aircraft it parked in California in mid-September. "Two of the airplanes are already back in operation,
and one (an MD-11) is currently in for scheduled maintenance in Xiamen, China," comments Goentgens. Another MD-11 will be integrated into Lufthansa Cargo's schedule in November after it completes its maintenance check. British Airways is recalling a 747-400 from desert storage for flights to Dallas for its winter schedule starting October. The airline is also freeing up a Boeing 777 to increase service from six to seven per day between London to JFK. Meanwhile, British Airways World Cargo (BAWC) is getting ready to deploy Boeing's new and very efficient B747-8f freighters, due for delivery at the beginning of 2011. "The three new Boeing 747-8f aircraft will operate to our existing schedule, maintaining regular services through Stansted, Hong Kong, Frankfurt, Pudong (Shanghai), Chicago, Delhi, among others," says Steve Gunning, managing director of BAWC. BAWC officials see the long-haul freighters as providing flexibility and capacity on resilient and growing lanes. The aircraft will be operated via a five-year wet lease agreement with Global Supply Systems (GSS).

Emirates, meanwhile, did not park any aircraft during the economic crisis nor cancel routes. It did, however, rationalize capacity, slowed its expansion, and embarked on a stringent cost containment program. "As such, when loads picked up we were already there with our existing services to carry them," Kumar says. "When any capacity becomes available, we are able to deploy it on charter operations, such as the many relief flights to Islamabad we have operated." Now, adds Kumar, Emirates is back to its aggressive expansion.

This year it launched services to Tokyo, Amsterdam, Prague, Madrid, and Dakar on the passenger side and added Almaty in Kazakhstan, and Kabul in Afghanistan to its existing freighter network. Given Emirates' new routes and additional capacity on existing routes, the carrier is expecting an increase in volumes at the end of the year of about 20 percent over 2009.

Slovníček A - abaft

abaft [abáft'] - I. prp. za ; II. adv. vzadu, dozadu (na lodi) ; III. s. lodní záď, zadní půle lodi

Don't you see pros of railway transport?

Rail transport is one of the most energy efficient means of mechanised land transport known. The rails provide very smooth and hard surfaces on which the wheels of the train may roll with a minimum of friction. This is more comfortable than most other forms of land transport and saves energy. Trains also have a small frontal area in relation to the load they are carrying, which cuts down on air resistance and thus energy usage. In all, under the right circumstances, a train needs 50-70% less energy to transport a given tonnage of freight (or given number of passengers), than does road transport. Furthermore, together with the sleepers, the rails distribute the weight of the train evenly, allowing significantly greater loads per axle/wheel than in road transport. 

Rail transport is also one of the safest modes of transport, and also makes a highly efficient use of space: a double tracked rail line can carry more passengers or freight in a given amount of time than a four-laned road.

As a result, rail transport is often the major form of public transport in many countries. In Asia, for example, many millions use trains as regular transport in India, South Korea, Japan, China, and elsewhere. 

Commercially, rail transport has had a mixed record. Most rail systems, including urban metro/subway systems, are highly subsidised and have never or rarely been profitable; however, their indirect benefits are often great. For example, despite a well-developed network consisting of 4 grades of trains and a widespread urban rail network in Seoul and Pusan, Korean National Rail is a nationalized organization that has never come close to having receipts equal costs. Similarly, passenger rail in the US and many other countries is still dependent on government subsidies. As a result levels of rail transport have in some times and places been reduced in order to save money. Conversely, US freight railways have consolidated and become more efficient in their progress toward profitability. Japan East Railways has taken an innovative and creative marketing stance and have achieved profitability as a result.

Like other forms of public transport, many railways have to make considerable investment in order to meet new requirements for security in the face of recent terrorism incidents. Securing railways is often more difficult than other modes of transport because stations are designed with easy access and high capacity as their primary goals rather than security, because most trains make many stops, rendering any sort of passenger screening difficult, and because securing the tracks as they run through cities and the countryside is impractical. 

A rail transport system consists of several necessary elements, and should be viewed from a system-wide perspective. Some locomotives may be wonderfully aesthetic constructions, but they won't work unless they are given an appropriate system on which to run.

Firstly there is the geography onto which the permanent way is built. Next is the requirements of the system - what was it built for? For carrying freight, commuters, medium or long-distance travellers? Has that requirement changed over time and left the system to adapt?

As a result of this, what is the type of system. Is it light or heavy rail, high-speed? To what gauge is it built? In a broader sense, rail transport includes monorail, rubber-tyred metros and maglev, since the cars also run in a guided path. The term "guideway" describes the non-traditional modes.
Trains require a propulsion mechanism: horses, or steam, diesel or electric locomotives. (The last of these options, the most energy efficient, requires electrification of the system).

To be electrified, a means of supplying electricity to the train is needed. This can be done with overhead wires or with a third rail system. The former is the more common method.

Depending on how much traffic they carry, railways can be built with a varying number of tracks. Rail lines that carry little traffic are often built with a single track which is used by trains travelling in both directions; on rail lines like these, "crossovers", "passing loops" or "passing sidings", which consist of short stretches of double track, are provided at certain points along the line to allow trains to pass each other, and travel in different directions. Alternatively, there may be larger sections of the line that are double track - effective timetabling can allow train travel up and down the partially double track line equivalent to travel on fully double tracks. Conversely, double tram track is sometimes intertwined at narrow passages. Single-track lines are cheaper to build, but can only handle a limited amount of traffic.
On busier lines, two or more tracks are provided, one or more for each direction of travel. On very busy lines as many as eight tracks (four tracks in each direction) are used to handle large amounts of traffic.

With the advent of containerized freight in the 1960s, rail and ship transportation have become an integrated network that move bulk goods very efficiently with a very low labour cost. An example is that goods from east Asia that are bound for Europe will often be shipped across the Pacific and transferred to trains to cross North America and be transferred back to a ship for the Atlantic crossing.
Major cities often have metro and/or light rail/tram systems. For a tram on the road the terms streetcar track or tram track are used, rather than railway or railroad. A tram with its own right-of-way is called a tramway.

Safety Reliable transportation of goods is the primary and determining precondition for its quality. Comparing rail traffic with other traffic modes, we find out the rail traffic is undoubtedly the most reliable traffic mode. This reliability does not result from a lower number of traffic accidents, but also lesser losses incurred from these accidents. Making use of the rail traffic we prevent dozens of casualties, hundreds of injuries and tens of millions of losses each year.

Accident rate of rail traffic participants is almost zero, which is not true for automobile, neither air transport. The road transport carries along a direct danger for participants' safety in every accident. Thereunto, the most serious accidents on rail tracks are caused by motor vehicles drivers at railway crossings. High level of safety makes the rail traffic one of the most favourable traffic modes.
At the same time, rail traffic disburdens overburdened network of highways and primary roads, which contributes to a smooth and safe road transport, which ensures better prevention from damages and losses on transported goods. 
 
Responsibility for ecology Human activities do not recognize borders of countries and continents; we are continuously observing a growth of production as well as consumption. The growth accompanies us on each step, including transport. Number and volume of transportations are growing and requirements on speed, punctuality, reliability and flexibility of transportations are increasing day by day. Millions of tons of goods transported each day by various traffic modes have an impact on quality of environment. Responsibility for its maintenance is a duty of all men and organizations regardless of the more and more perceptible appeal to environment protection. Ability of meeting customer's requirements in an environment-friendly manner has therefore become one of the basic criteria for quality of transport services, as well as a significant competitive advantage of railway carriers.

Railway traffic is an efficient and environment-friendly transport system in many cases, whereas large volumes of goods can be transported on long distances quickly and with a minor impact on environment. Compared with automobile or air transport, railway transport produces the lowest amount of emissions and requires much lower costs on regeneration of damaged environment. From the total amount of costs on reduction of negative impacts of transport industry on environment, only 8% comes from railway transport, while up to 90% comes from road transport, even though its traffic performance is by 50% lower than the traffic performance of railway transport. Another important argument placing the railway transport above the road transport is a lower occupation of agricultural land. While road transport occupies almost 74% of such land, railway transport occupies 27% only, even though its traffic performance is almost twice as big as the one of the road traffic It can also be proved by the fact, that almost 7 hectares of agricultural land is needed in the road transport to execute 1 million of tonkilometers, while in railway transport it is 1 hectare only.

Also noise strain produced by the railway transport on environment is lower than by the road transport. Intensity of rail traffic results from time tables and railway network is mostly built up out of urban zones, while several strong road traffic streams are also directed to urban zones.

Transportation capacity and price conditions In national economy, the railway traffic has its specific and irreplaceable position. It enables and facilitates transportations of goods, transportation of which by a different traffic mode would be too expensive and therefore inefficient. It enables transportation of bigger quantity of goods on long or medium distances at relatively low costs.

Lower transport restrictions In comparison with road carriers, the important advantage of railway transport can also be lower transport restrictions. The road carriers must respect several regulations, such as limitations in utilizing highways and primary roads, limitations in traffic peaks, or obligations to keep safety breaks. Advantage of railway transport out of the EU countries is also shorter waiting times on border crossings.

Optimalization of transport processes Considering all transport claims a new trend of a combined transport is coming to the sphere of transportations. This transportation system lays stress on utilizing of railway transport supplemented by advantages of other traffic modes. It combines flexibility and fast transposition of goods with a reasonable consumption of energy and positive ecological aspect, minimizes impacts on environment and that way charges the society with rational ecological costs.

An unquestionable advantage of the combined transport is a possibility of connection to integrated logistic chain using combined transport units and "door-to-door" delivery of goods. As transportation in combined transport units is executed without goods handling, there is a lower risk of losses or damages on goods and therefore the whole transportation process is accelerated.

Slovníček A - Abaddon

Abaddon [abadon] - 1. hebr. anděl zhoubce; 2. propast pekelná; 3. zhoubce

Jáchym Topol’s latest novel risks derision while at the same time winning prestige

Genocide, history, fame: Jáchym Topol has a lot on his mind. But something else was preoccupying the novelist - perhaps the country’s most successful - as he sat down at a Prague 5 café one recent morning.

“They’re giving me the prize tomorrow, and I need to buy a dress shirt. Where can you buy a dress shirt around here? What about my haircut?“ he asked, only half in jest.

The prize Topol was referring to is the Jaroslav Seifert Prize, the most prestigious literary award in the Czech Republic, which the Charter 77 Foundation awarded the writer for his most recent novel, Chladnou zemí, or Cold Land, published earlier this year. Set in the Terezín ghetto and in Belarus, the novel continues Topol’s practice of re-examining history through the Surrealist-tinted lens of his imagination.

The subject of Cold Land is Topol’s darkest yet: the Belarusian genocide, propagated by the Nazis as part of “Generalplan Ost,“ the ethnic cleansing of Eastern Europe which led to the death of approximately 4 million men, women and children, about half the population of Belarus.

“Belarus shocked me. I went there because one of my books was published there, and I learned what many people still do not realize: that the country is an unhappy place where the machinery of mass murder was tested,“ he said.

But Topol is a novelist, not a historian.

Like his previous books, Cold Land puts an imaginative spin on the events it depicts, and this Topolian method of reappropriating history has offended some critics who believe Topol makes light of atrocities. But Cold Land has won the approval of Ivan Klíma and Arnošt Lustig, two prominent Czech writers who lived in Terezín, and of Tomas Kosta, a German publisher who also lived in the ghetto city.

“I don’t see myself as a castigator or a declaimer. And I’m not making fun of these events. The black, skewed humor is there because we cannot write about World War II in that affected style which was used in 1955. We have a certain distance now,“ he said.

Many books have risen to prominence on waves of controversy, and polarizing subject matter usually ensures brisk sales. But Topol does not hesitate to say his latest novel deserves more praise than anything he has written previously.

“To tell you the truth, I really do think this is my best book. I have a feeling with most of my books that I should have done more or done better, but I feel like [Cold Land] is exactly how I wanted it,“ he said.

In many ways, Topol is a writer obsessed with history. Sestra, published in Czech in 1994 and translated into English as City Sister Silver in 2000, is widely considered Topol’s early masterpiece. In it, Topol narrates the events of November 1989, when “time exploded,“ as he phrased it.

A more recent novel dealing with the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, Kloktat dehet, or Gargling with Tar, was published to wide acclaim in 2005 and translated into English earlier this year. (See book review in The Prague Post, Aug. 12). With the publication of Cold Land, Topol has covered nearly all of the major historical events of 20th-century Central European history, with the exception of World War I.

But Topol never set out to be a historical novelist, even one whose style is strikingly original. Rather, he says, he feels somewhat hemmed in by his nation’s history, which is too pervasive to be ignored.

“I would really love to write about people - she loves him, he loves her or not - a major drama. But on every street and in every village in Central Europe lived someone who was sent to a death camp, or someone who sent him there. I cannot write a village story from the 1950s, ’60s, ’70s or ’80s and not have communists or Nazis in it, because that would be unrealistic. This teases me a great deal; it annoys me,“ he said.

The common wisdom among writers is that too much fame too early can ruin one’s talent. Indeed, having won the Czech Republic’s top literary prize at the age of 48, Topol has begun to wonder how he can outdo himself. But he also has a profound sense of cathartic accomplishment with Cold Land and its positive reception.

“I have the feeling that [Cold Land] is the end of a journey. I needed to investigate these East European murders, but I don’t want to specialize in them. I don’t ever want to go to Belarus again,“ he said.

Where Topol will go next is a question on every reader’s mind.

“We cannot write about World War II in that affected style which was used in 1955.“ Jáchym Topol, writer


THE TOPOL FILE * Born: Aug. 4, 1962 * Books published: Six novels, two collections of poetry, one short story collection, one play * Prizes: 2010 Jaroslav Seifert Prize * Day job: Writer for daily Lidové noviny

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genocide, history, fame - genocida, historie, sláva
novelist - romanopisec
mind - mysl
has a lot on his mind - má toho hodně na mysli
piece of mind - kousek mysli
Cold Land - chladná země
What about my haircut? - Co můj účes?
imagination - představivost
the ethnic cleansing - etnické čistky
4 million men, women and children - 4 miliony mužů, žen a dětí
Belarus shocked me - Bělorusko mě školovalo
I went there - Šel jsem tam
castigator - kritik
brisk sales - čilý prodej
writer obsessed with history - spisovatel posedlý historií
the machinery of mass murder - stroj masové vraždy
translated into English - přeložen do angličtiny

Brazil eyes microchips in trees for forest management

A chainsaw buzzes, branches snap, and an Amazon tree crashes to the ground.

It could be just another of the thousands of trees felled each year in Brazil’s portion of the world’s largest forest except for one detail: a microchip attached to its base holding data about its location, size and who cut it down.

With a hand-held device, forestry engineer Paulo Borges pulls up the tree’s vital statistics from the chip -- a 14-meter-high (46-foot) tree known as a “mandiocao” cut down in Mato Grosso state, the southern edge of the Amazon where the forest has largely been cleared to create farmland.

It is only a small pilot project, but its leaders say the microchip system has the potential to be a big step forward in the battle to protect the Amazon.

The chips allow land owners using sustainable forestry practices to distinguish their wood from that acquired through illegal logging that each year destroys swathes of the forest.

Each microchip tells a tree’s story from the point it was felled to the sawmill that processed and sold the wood, key information for buyers who want to know where it came from.

“People talk a lot these days about wood coming from sustainable forestry practices -- this is a system that can prove it,” said Borges, of the organization Acao Verde, or Green Action, which is managing the project on a large farm.

Brazil is under international pressure to reduce deforestation that destroys thousands of square miles of the Amazon each year and make the country one of the world’s biggest sources of greenhouse gasses.
 
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another of the thousands of trees felled each year - další z tisíců pokácených stromů každý rok
except for one detail - s výjimkou jednoho detailu
data about its location, size and who cut it down - údaje o jeho velikosti, poloze a kdo jej porazil
It is only a small pilot project - to je jen malý pilotní projekt
the microchip system has the potential to be a big step forward in the battle to protect the Amazon - mikročip systém má potenciál být velkým krokem kupředu v boji na ochranu Amazonie

Bosnian exporters battle politics, urge reforms

As a successful furniture exporter, Elizabeta Josipovic is one of a new breed of Bosnian entrepreneurs who have moved beyond the bitter ethnic rivalries that have stunted the country‘s development. But she remains in thrall to a government that, nearly 15 years after Bosnia was riven by Europe‘s deadliest fighting since World War II, she says still spends much of its time and money playing politics instead of helping mid-sized firms such as hers breathe new life into a still stagnant economy.

Started in 1998 in the Bosnian Serb Republic town of Prijedor with a staff of just four, Josipovic‘s Sconto-Prom today employs around 500 workers at three production plants and seven shops across the country, selling to outlets in the European Union and beyond. Josipovic, whose main client is Swedish chain IKEA, plans further expansion.

„We can‘t just sit and wait for others to do the job for us,“ she said in her furniture shop in the nearby town of Banja Luka. „We are here on our own.“

A small, energetic woman and a rare female face in Bosnia‘s business community, Josipovic says exporters are crying out for state help at a time of economic crisis when only the most persistent and talented operators can survive on their own.

„There are no state laws,“ she said. „It seems that our political structures are not interested in creating a state based on law.“

Bosnians are due to vote in parliamentary and presidential elections on Oct. 3, campaigning for which -- along with prolonged rivalry between the country‘s two autonomous regions -- has delayed privatisations and other reforms, experts say.


new breed - nový typ/druh/plemeno
to be in thrall - být v područí, být závislý
to stunt - brzdit, zarážet
to cry out - volat po, dožadovat se
persistent - vytrvalý, houževnatý