Heathrow Airport has seen cargo volumes increase by 2.7 per cent in February to 121,424 tonnes, with exports to Latin America growing most strongly.

The region grew by five per cent helped by increased frequencies from Avianca and Aeromexico. Trade with Mexico saw the biggest surge, up 40 per cent. This was followed by 34 per cent growth to Nigeria, 32 per cent to Turkey and 12 per cent to China. East Asia received a strong boost as well, with Vietnam Airlines have moved operations from Gatwick to Heathrow and British Airways launching Kuala Lumpur services. Garuda Indonesia will start direct services to Jakarta in April.

Heathrow Airport chief executive officer, John Holland-Kaye says the results show why the hub must receive approval for a third runway. “This month we’ve seen a big boost in exports to Latin America and East Asia. With an expanded Heathrow Britain can do even better. We’ll open up 40 new trading links and supercharge British trade with the fastest growing markets in the world.”

For January and February, volumes were up by 2.8 per cent to 240,639 tonnes though on a yearly basis from March 2015 and February 2015 it was down by 0.5 per cent to 1.5 million tonnes.