newstodate.aero
Mar 09, 2017 (newstodate): Within the span of only four years, Qatar Airways has grown its presence in the Norwegian market to become the leading carrier in Norway's seafood export from Oslo Gardermoen Airport.
The first passenger aircraft flight by Qatar Airways to Oslo was performed on October 5, 2011, and starting from January 29, 2013, Qatar Airways Cargo introduced its first freighter service at Oslo, adding a second frequency at Oslo from July 6, 2013, a third from October 27, 2013, and a fourth from October 1, 2014, and going up to five, periodically even six weekly freighter services from winter 2016/17.
-Qatar Airways is thus now offering capacity to Norwegian seafood exporters with seven weekly passenger flights as well as five freighter operations, says Rob Veltman, Qatar Airways Cargo VP Cargo Europe, one of the speakers at yesterday's Norwegian seafood air logistics seminar in Oslo.
-Our current focus on the Norwegian market is, however, not driven by strategy. Basically we, like other airlines, are opportunistic: we will go where the business is and as long as it makes sense as to revenues and yields.
-Even if we are today the leader as to uplift capacity in the Norwegian seafood market, we would still be fully capable and willing to even increase our services as warranted by this growing market.
-There are definitely huge growth potentials here - but there is at the same time a marked need for improvements on the exporters' and forwarders' side, as well.
Today, Norway has for example a remarkably low penetration rate of the e-AWB. People obviously still prefer calling by phones and exchanging papers rather than utilizing the time-saving technologies immediate available for electronic communication. It is a striking fact that not even all of this country's five largest seafood forwarding companies are e-AWB capable.
-Other snags include an overly large volume of no-shows probably because some customers make last-minute changes for last-dime savings on rates despite previous bookings, or shipments arrive late, or not at all, due for a variety of reasons including weather, flat tire, traffic jams and what not. In many cases this may be also a thin cover over deeper, underlying causes.
-But having said that, we are happy with serving this market and do see large potentials for growth. We are determined to grow with the market, but the market is still immature with a number of issues to be tackled, says Mr Veltman.
The first passenger aircraft flight by Qatar Airways to Oslo was performed on October 5, 2011, and starting from January 29, 2013, Qatar Airways Cargo introduced its first freighter service at Oslo, adding a second frequency at Oslo from July 6, 2013, a third from October 27, 2013, and a fourth from October 1, 2014, and going up to five, periodically even six weekly freighter services from winter 2016/17.
-Qatar Airways is thus now offering capacity to Norwegian seafood exporters with seven weekly passenger flights as well as five freighter operations, says Rob Veltman, Qatar Airways Cargo VP Cargo Europe, one of the speakers at yesterday's Norwegian seafood air logistics seminar in Oslo.
-Our current focus on the Norwegian market is, however, not driven by strategy. Basically we, like other airlines, are opportunistic: we will go where the business is and as long as it makes sense as to revenues and yields.
-Even if we are today the leader as to uplift capacity in the Norwegian seafood market, we would still be fully capable and willing to even increase our services as warranted by this growing market.
-There are definitely huge growth potentials here - but there is at the same time a marked need for improvements on the exporters' and forwarders' side, as well.
Today, Norway has for example a remarkably low penetration rate of the e-AWB. People obviously still prefer calling by phones and exchanging papers rather than utilizing the time-saving technologies immediate available for electronic communication. It is a striking fact that not even all of this country's five largest seafood forwarding companies are e-AWB capable.
-Other snags include an overly large volume of no-shows probably because some customers make last-minute changes for last-dime savings on rates despite previous bookings, or shipments arrive late, or not at all, due for a variety of reasons including weather, flat tire, traffic jams and what not. In many cases this may be also a thin cover over deeper, underlying causes.
-But having said that, we are happy with serving this market and do see large potentials for growth. We are determined to grow with the market, but the market is still immature with a number of issues to be tackled, says Mr Veltman.