Cathay sees another tonnage decline in March

   Cathay Pacific Airways experienced a 5.3-percent, year-over-year drop in cargo tonnage last month, but saw an increase in passenger traffic.
   Cargo traffic for Cathay and Dragonair finished the month at 136,504 tons with a 66.4 percent load factor, which represents a 1.9-point drop from March 2012. Revenue tonnage declined as well, falling by 10.8 percent, on 8.3 percent less capacity. In the first three months of the year, cargo tonnage was off last year’s pace by 1.4 percent and 4.8 percent of the airline’s cargo capacity had evaporated.
   These numbers have been par for the course so far in 2013, according to James Woodrow, Cathay’s general manager of cargo sales. He put a bunch of the blame on slow demand recovery after the Chinese New Year celebrations in February.
   “We saw little change in the overall market situation in March,” he said in a statement. “The major airfreight markets have been soft for two years now and, with no sign of any sustained pick-up in sight, we will continue to manage our freighter capacity in line with market demand.” – Jon Ross