Cargo volumes down at Schiphol

Cargo volumes at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport showed a decline of 9.1% to 767,000 tons for the first six months of 2019.

Schiphol officials cited fewer cargo flights because of slot scarcity as well as a weakening of the global air cargo market as root causes.

The number of carrier movements at Schiphol edged down by 0.1% to 242,107 over the six-month period.

Schiphol posted strong financials for the period, during which revenues increased to €133 million ($147 million) compared to €115 million for the first half of 2018.

In the first six months of 2019, Schiphol invested €336 million to improve customer service and operational efficiency, compared to €232 million invested over the same period in 2018.

Relative to comparable European hubs, passenger growth at Schiphol is slowing, although there was a slight growth of 1.4% to 34.5 million passengers over the period.

The total number of passengers at all Royal Schiphol Group airports grew by 2.2% to 38.7 million, compared to overall passenger throughput of 37.8 million for the first half of 2018.

Passenger volumes increased further by 8.9% to 3.2 million at Eindhoven Airport and by 8.2% to 954,000 at Rotterdam The Hague Airport.

Royal Schiphol Group announced investment in the construction of Europe’s first sustainable kerosene plant and in a study of the production of sustainable kerosene based on solar electricity and CO2 obtained from air.