18/5/2020

Dear all Valued Customers

 

Having transitioned to flying on-demand and scheduled cargo-only flights, U.S. and Canadian passenger airlines are doubling down on their new business model in May.

 

Cargo is one of the few sources of revenue for airlines these days and after idling most of their fleets because of coronavirus travel restrictions and safety fears, shippers are itching to find available air transport to move their goods. Delta Air Lines increased its frequent Shanghai-to-Los Angeles and Shanghai-to-Atlanta scheduled flights to weekly service, via Seoul, South Korea, into daily operations using large twin-aisle jetliners.

 

United Airlines plans to operate more than 1,100 dedicated cargo flights in May, up from 770 in April. The airline now offers service between its six U.S. hubs and 18 airports worldwide — five more than a month ago — from major cities in Asia, Europe and the Middle East, to San Juan, Puerto Rico in the Caribbean.

 

Meanwhile, American Airlines has expanded its cargo schedule in May to provide 140 weekly flights to 15 cities in Asia-Pacific, Europe and the Caribbean. That compares with 80 flights last week. New destinations include daily flights between Dallas-Fort Worth and Hong Kong, and weekly flights between DFW and Beijing. Chicago gets weekly flights to London Heathrow and Paris; and Philadelphia adds weekly flights to Rome, San Juan, and Zurich.

 

North of the border, Air Canada is increasing the number of scheduled flights with passenger jets as freighters to more cities, including Auckland, New Zealand; Brussels; Seoul; Sydney; and Zurich. “As countries around the globe begin to recover from the pandemic, and the demand for air cargo rises in response, we will work quickly to respond to your requests to add new cities to our network and/or increase frequencies on existing routes. Of course, we will continue to maximize the use of the cargo capacity on United’s passenger flights as well,” United’s Cargo Chief said.

 

Air Canada was an early adopter of removing seats from planes to clear space for boxes of personal protective equipment and other lightweight goods. It has converted three Boeing 777-300ER aircraft and recently removed the seats from an Airbus A330-300, which is now operating scheduled flights to and from Tel Aviv, Israel.

 

As countries around the globe begin to recover from the pandemic, and the demand for air cargo rises in response, the North American airlines have worked quickly to add new cities to their network and/or increase frequencies on existing routes.

 

USTR Extends Certain Exclusions for Six Months

 

The United States Trade Representative (USTR) released a notice yesterday that 13 product specific exclusions on Section 301 List 1, were being extended past their scheduled expiration date of May 14, 2020. The announced extension for the exclusion from the 7.5 percent additional tariff is only for the approved products and for an additional six months, until December 31, 2020. Included in the list are air purifying equipment and machinery, hydraulic solenoid valves and parts thereof, steel and aluminium spools, certain microscopes and microscope accessories. See the full list of HTS codes in the USTR announcement here.

 

Note that all the remaining Section 301 List 1 exclusions that were published on May 14, 2019 have expired.

 

India Freight Update   

 

Despite the lockdown in India scheduled to expire May 17, 2020,BRI USA has received notification that ZIM is suspending all service to India until May 31, 2020 due to the continued congestion and import/export issues.

 

With their alliance, this means that in addition to ZIM, carriers Maersk, MSC and Hamburg-Sud will also not be calling India ports through May.

 

While other carriers may still be calling India ports, the container activities are insignificant at this time.

 

BRi USA has also received the following update from our BRI India Office on the logistics conditions in India:

 

• Some carriers are planning to announce ad hoc calls for a few of India’s ports next week. Otherwise, carriers continue to announce blank sailings and vessel delays. Port operations are preparing to begin export moves next week.

 

• Freighters continue to operate, offering the majority of the capacity at increased rates.

 

• Congestion is easing at container freight stations. Many are preparing to resume export operations next week.

 

• Many blockades have been removed and trucks are moving without delay. A few pockets of driver shortages still remain as well as some states continue to enforce curfews.

 

BRi ERP and Order Management Program

 

To ensure you maintain visibility to your shipments as they move through the supply chain, please take advantage of BRi PATHWAY.

 

The information in PATHWAY is real-time and available 24/7.

 

To obtain a login for your account, please respond to this email so we can get you started!

 

As a valued customer, we hope that you will continue to trust us to source the best options for your supply chain needs now and into the future. Please feel free to contact your Customer Solutions Representative, should you have any queries or questions regarding USA News.

 

Keeping you updated,

BRi Customer Solutions Team

Back to News Page