Siginon Aviation ramps up operations in JKIA
Siginon Aviation, a ground handler based in Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), Nairobi and Eldoret International Airport in Kenya, is to revamp its ramp handling services with a multi-million-dollar investment on new ramp equipment. The ramp equipment comprises of 20-tonne main deck high loaders, 7-tonne lower deck high loaders, pallet transporters, ground power units, pushback, […]
Astral Aerial and Yamaha to promote drones in Kenya
Astral Aerial Solutions has sealed a deal with Yamaha Motor Company to provide last mile air cargo delivery and crop spraying services in Kenya. The deal, signed at the 7th Tokyo International Conference on African Development will see Astral providing market entry support for the Yamaha Fazer R G2 drone. Astral Aerial Solutions aims to […]
Kenya Airways picks GSAs for Geneva and Rome flights
Kenya Airways has appointed cargo GSAs and warehousing partners for its new flights from Geneva and Rome to Nairobi. In Geneva, GACSA and been appointed the GSA with Swissport providing warehouse services, with IAS Air Cargo acting as GSA in Rome and XPH operating the warehouse. They will provide services for Kenya Airways on the […]
60 seconds with Siginon Aviation’s Maarten Klinjistra
Maarten Klinjistra is general manager of Siginon Aviation in Kenya. He is well versed in all matters aviation having worked in East, West and South Africa and provided regional oversight in strategic African markets such as DR Congo, Zambia, Ethiopia and Nigeria. He also likes a good steak. ACW: If you were sent to an […]
Kenya to adopt TIACA Cargo Service Quality tool
Kenya will be the first country to adopt TIACA’s Cargo Service Quality tool nationwide, in a bid to improve standards at all airports. Kenya Airports Authority (KAA) is aiming to implement the online tool at all Kenyan cargo hubs by mid next year, allowing forwarders to rate and review the service quality they receive at […]
Panalpina doubles cold storage at Nairobi airport
Panalpina is expanding and investing in Kenya by doubling its cold storage space at Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport. The facilities have been expanded by 1,500 square metres and features dedicated loading bays for skidded or palletised cargo, and separate cold rooms, which is unique to the airport. Panalpina started operations in Nairobi in 2015 […]
Ethiopia leads the way with 2025 vision
In Ethiopia, there is something better than 20-20 vision, and that is Vision 2025, an ambitious plan to make the country’s flag carrier the leading aviation group in Africa, writes Stuart Flitton. The airline’s freight business is key to this dream with Ethiopian Cargo and Logistics Services operating eight all-cargo aircraft to 39 destinations in […]
West Atlantic to sell two BAE ATP Freighters to EnComm
West Atlantic will sell two BAE ATP Freighter aircraft to Nairobi, Kenya-based EnComm in a deal that also commits to spares, engineering and training support. The airline decided in 2017 to start marketing the aircraft for dry-leasing and sale, and as part of the transaction, West Atlantic also brokered an additional two BAE ATP passenger […]
AFKLMP adds new routes to its summer schedule
Air France KLM Martinair Cargo (AFKLMP) will operate new routes for the summer providing connections to locations including Taipei, Fortaleza and Seattle. It will provide capacity from both hubs at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport and Amsterdam Airport Schiphol, where the airline offers 1,115 weekly services to 116 unique destinations around the world. From Paris […]
Turkish Cargo flower traffic blooms on wide body cargo aircraft
Turkish Cargo scheduled additional 12 flights between January 26 and February 12 in order to satisfy demand of Valentine’s Day. The airline carried 906 tonnes of cut roses to the Netherlands from Kenya’s capital Nairobi. Turkish Cargo became the air cargo carrier that had carried the most flowers from Nairobi between those dates with its […]
Roses are red, violets are blue, air cargo flies flowers for you
The air cargo industry made sure that lovers around the world had the perfect flower for Valentine’s Day, transporting thousands of tonnes of produce in time for the big day. Cargolux Airlines International added close to 1,200 tonnes of extra capacity to meet the peak demand, adding to the 20 weekly flights out of Nairobi, […]
AFKLMP spreads the love with 3,000t of flowers for Valentine’s Day
Air cargo has helped spread the love for Valentine’s Day with airlines busily flying flowers in time for the big day. Over a two week period, Air France KLM Martinair (AFKLMP) Cargo shipped around 3,000 tonnes of flowers from production and export nations including Kenya, Ecuador and Colombia to Europe. AFKLMP used Boeing 747-400 Freighter […]
Astral Aviation delivers humanitarian aid to stricken Yemen
Astral Aviation operated a humanitarian flight on Saturday (25 November) from Nairobi to war-torn Sanaa in Yemen with 15 tonnes of vaccines for over 600,000 children against diphtheria, tetanus and other diseases. The African carrier ran the Boeing 727-200 flight on behalf of Chapman Freeborn and UNICEF into Sanaa Airport, which had been closed from 6 November. […]
Network Airline Services extends contract with AFS Kenya
Network Airline Services (NAS) has signed a two-year extension to its contract with Africa Flight Services Kenya (AFS Kenya) to provide cargo handling for its four flights a week into Nairobi. AFS Kenya will handle 11,500 tonnes of cargo a year for NAS’ MD-11 and Boeing 747 Freighter operations, which arrive in Nairobi from Liege […]
NAM and Astral sign wet lease deal for B747F with Air Atlanta
Network Airline Management (NAM) and Kenya-based Astral Aviation have signed a long-term wet lease with Air Atlanta Icelandic adding a factory-built, nose-loader B747-400 Freighter to their existing managed fleet of three MD11Fs. The B747-400F made its inaugural flight from London Stansted Airport to Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport yesterday, expanding NAM’s capacity to East Africa. […]
Pharma standards can help other cool chain sectors
Air France-KLM-Martinair Cargo (AFKLMP) is looking to learn from the way pharmaceuticals are now being handled and moved across the air cargo supply chain. Over the last few years, signficant investments have been made by operators whether that is in pharma facilities, or improving processes and standards through CEIV Pharma. As a result traffic has […]
Freight at Nairobi grows 75.5% as Africa tops regional growth
Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport saw the most significant growth of global gateways in August, according to figures released by the Airports Council International (ACI). The airport recorded a 75.5 per cent year-over-year (YOY) increase in freight volumes, but having been in negative territory for several months in the last year, it was able to recover […]
Siginon Aviation appoints Klinjstra as new general manager
Kenyan cargo and ground handler Siginon Aviation has appointed former regional director for cargo sales at Martinair Cargo in South Africa, Maarten Klinjstra (pictured below) as general manager. He will oversee the general management of all Siginon Aviation operations at Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport and Eldoret International Airport. Klinjstra is seasoned aviation and air cargo […]
Freight volumes up 8.9% in July, ACI reports
The Airports Council International (ACI) says in July freight volumes increased by 8.9 per cent fuelled by strengthening global trade and industrial production. On a year-to-date basis, global volume reached 8.4 per cent, which ACI notes drawing a particularly stark contrast with July 2016, where this number stood at 0.9 per cent. Most regions posted […]
Panalpina completes acquisition of Kenyan forwarder Air Connection
Panalpina has completed the acquisition of Air Connection, a specialised forwarder of flowers and vegetables following approval by the Competition Authority of Kenya. Air Connection was founded in 1993 and has operations close to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi and in Mombasa, specialising in the export of flowers and vegetables from Kenya to destinations […]
Panalpina seeing fresh African perishable trends
Panalpina is well positioned to grow its airfreight perishable volumes from Kenya, but there are some new trends emerging and challenges ahead. In May, it said it would acquire Kenyan forwarder Air Connection, a specialist in the export of flowers and vegetables. This follows the buy-out last year of Airflo in Kenya and launch of […]
Extensive opportunities for Siginon, but imports slow this year
Kenyan cargo handler Siginon Aviation believes there are plenty of future opportunities for it as Kenya and Nairobi ‘s airfreight market continues to grow. Siginon handles for Qatar Airways Cargo, Cargolux, Singapore Airlines Cargo, CargoLogicAir and others at Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (NBO). Imports manager, Jared Oswago (pictured below) says Kenya is the regional […]
Digital innovations and flowers high priorities for AFKLMP
Air France-KLM-Martinair Cargo (AFKLMP) is focussing much of its energy on digitisation and innovation. The launch of myCargo is contributing to its ambition to innovate customer service by offering relevant and improved digital services. A personalised toolkit for customers, namely employees working at freight forwarders, myCargo is a portal where customers can make bookings, quote […]
Kuehne + Nagel acquires two forwarders specialising in perishables
Kuehne + Nagel has expanded its global perishables network with the acquisition of CFI (Commodity Forwarders Inc) an airfreight forwarder of perishables products in the US, and Trillvane Ltd, one of the largest perishables specialists in Kenya. These it says will add more than 150,000 tonnes of perishables to the forwarder’s perishables network and further “strengthens […]
AMI UK passes 1 million spot-rate milestone
AMI has provided its one millionth cargo spot-rate quote in the UK. The trade-only airfreight and express wholesaler opened its Spot Rate desk – specialising in live market quotes – in 2007. The Spot Rate team is based in London and Manchester and handles 60 per cent of AMI’s total airfreight business in the UK. The success […]
Solar-powered cargo facility for Swissport at JKIA
Swissport Kenya has opened Kenya’s first solar-powered cargo facility at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) in Nairobi and is aiming for it to cover 30 per cent of the facility’s energy demand. The move will also reduce energy costs and the solar panels will power cold rooms at the cargo facility. The 104KWp solar PV […]
NAM and Astral Aviation fly urgent relief goods to Somaliland
Network Airline Management (NAM) and Astral Aviation transported over 57 tonnes of urgent humanitarian relief goods on behalf of the Canadian Red Cross to a field hospital in Hargeisa, Somaliland earlier this month. The cargo, which was mainly IV fluid, was flown from Liege to Nairobi on Astral’s and NAM’s wet leased B747-400F. From Nairobi, […]
MD11 freighter service to start at Doncaster Sheffield
Doncaster Sheffield Airport has won a new cargo contract bringing flowers and vegetables to the UK. The airport has secured a deal with Network Airline Management who begin a weekly MD11 service from Nairobi in Kenya to Yorkshire this week. It will be the airport’s first scheduled flight handling perishable goods opening up a major […]
Cargolux looking to open up new African markets by the end of the year
Cargolux Airlines International is looking at opening up two new markets in Africa by the end of the year, regional director for Africa Jonathan Clark (pictured below) tells Air Cargo Week. They will probably be perishable markets and though Clark cannot say where they are, Cargolux has its eyes on two potential ones in East […]
Panalpina to acquire Kenyan specialist perishables freight forwarder
Panalpina is to acquire Air Connection – a Kenya-based forwarder which specialises in the export of flowers and vegetables. The move comes after Panalpina’s acquisition of Airflo in Kenya in 2016 and only two weeks after the company formally announced the launch of its global Perishables Network. Panalpina will acquire the family-owned Kenyan company Air […]