CARGO volumes at Frankfurt Airport continued to decline in February as the global economic downturn and war in Ukraine affected the air freight market, according to the airport authority.
The German air cargo hub in February registered an 11 per cent year-on-year decline in cargo volumes to 146,620 tonnes. Volumes were also 9.1 per cent behind pre-Covid 2019 levels and followed an 18 per cent year-on-year drop in cargo demand in January.
Explaining the fall, airport operator Fraport said: "As in the previous months, the decline was attributable to the overall economic slowdown and the discontinued air traffic to/from Russia."
Revenues increased 49 per cent year on year to EUR3.2 billion (US$3.4 billion), earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation increased 36 per cent to EUR1 billion and net profit increased 81.5 per cent on 2021 to EUR166.6 million."In the past fiscal year, we've seen particularly strong demand for air travel from leisure passengers and vacationers. Our group airports worldwide also benefited from this trend," said Fraport chief executive Stefan Schulte.
"Our primary goal is to maintain stable operations and enhance our resilience in responding to irregular situations. This remains a challenging task in view of the structural factors we are facing, such as the geopolitically-related airspace restrictions and the current constraints on the German labour market," Mr Schulte said.