OREANDA-NEWS. March 15, 2012. An important cargo link between Northern Europe and China has been launched. Russia’s largest purely freight airline, AirBridgeCargo Airlines (ABC), is taking off for Bei-jing via Moscow once a week using a Boeing 747-400 from 10 March onwards. The new route primarily serves to transport engineering and automotive parts from the indus-trial region in North Germany to the Far East. The logistics services company with a global presence, Kuhne + Nagel, will be the main customer for the new service.

“The new connection underlines the growing significance of Hannover Airport on the cargo and logistics map. Hannover Airport is an ideal location with its unrestricted operating permit – 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” says State Economics Secretary Dr. Oliver Liersch. “It is also the only airport in North Germany, which has a catchment area stretching from the Baltic to France on account of its excel-lent infrastructure links,” he adds.

Dr. Raoul Hille, Managing Director of Hannover Airport, underscores the message: “This new route is primarily aimed at the freight forwarding industry – the Asia-Pacific market in particular has a strong interest in direct flights to North Germany, Northern and North-Eastern Europe. There is significant savings potential for the logistics sector on ac-count of the shorter operating times on the ground and therefore lower motorway charges and fuel costs. We are also making a strategic contribution to cut carbon dioxide emissions as part of the move away from fossil fuels by deliberately shortening the feeder services.”

“We can include North Germany, Northern and North-East Europe in the global distribution of flows of goods in the best possible way through our central hub in Moscow. We have also recently opened new bases in Asia at Chengdu and Zhengzhou in addition to Beijing,” says Ludwig Hamburger, Vice President and Regional Director EMEA, Air-BridgeCargo Airlines.

Klaus Jager, a member of the management team at Kuhne + Nagel (AG & Co.) KG, Central European Air Freight, adds: “We are establishing an excellent door-to-door prod-uct with this route. The launch of the regular cargo link be-tween Hanover and Beijing is an important sign for all the logistics companies in the region that freight traffic is be-coming more important at Hannover Airport – not only from a European point of view, but also across Asia.”

The aim is to consistently expand the Hanover catchment area in the light of the forecast growth in goods traffic be-tween China and Europe over the next few years. Logistics companies will particularly benefit from this.

The new air freight route to Beijing is a huge success story for Hannover Airport and it comes in addition to the current building work taking place at the Air Cargo Terminal and TNT Express at the western part of the airport.

The airport subsidiaries Aviation Ground Services Hannover GmbH and AirCargo Services Hannover GmbH, which have already successfully handled the charter cargo flights operated by Polet Airline, are providing the ground handling services for the plane and the freight handling.