SPECIAL FEATURE ITALY 5/5. Air freight is important for Italy, as it meets the needs of a number of industrial sectors that are essential for the country. Nevertheless, the market remains relatively stable.
In Europe, air freight accounts for a very small share of the movement of goods in terms of volumes. Italy is no exception, with a share of 0.1% in 2022, according to the latest Eurostat data available, compared to an average of 0.2% in the European Union as a whole. This share has historically been very stable since it was the same in 2012. In terms of value, the air freight market share is estimated at 9.4%, including 12.2% for exports and 6.7% for imports, according to a survey by the Bank of Italy on international freight transport.
Source : Eurostat.
Over the past ten years, the cumulative traffic of Italian airports has stabilised at slightly above the million-tonne mark with variations, sometimes downwards or upwards, but in fairly moderate proportions. Only 2020 deviated from this historical trend, with a drop to 842,000 tonnes during the Covid-19 pandemic.
In 2023, Italian airports handled 1,086,810 tonnes of air cargo, according to data from Assaeroporti, the Italian association of airport operators. This result marks a decrease of 1.6% compared to the previous year and is down 1.5% compared to 2019. Freight traffic by air accounts for 94% of tonnages, compared to 4.5% for postal traffic and 1.5% for trucked freight.
Highly concentrated traffic
Source : Assaeroporti.
Milan airport, in the north of the country, largely dominates the Italian air cargo market. Despite a decline in traffic of 6.8% in 2023 compared to the previous year, it occupies the top step of the podium with 672,000 tonnes, which represents 65% of air traffic handled in Italy. According to the first available figures, freight volumes have grown in the first quarter of 2024, with however an erosion that seems to have been seen in the express transport segment.
Rome's Fiumicino Airport is the second largest cargo airport in Italy, with almost 190,000 tonnes of goods handled in 2023, up 35% compared to 2022. This site represents 17.4% of the total volume of air freight. In recent years, the airport has undertaken to position itself in a rapidly expanding sector both for the air freight sector and for the Italian economy: pharmaceutical products. "Fiumicino airport has all the potential to become the reference hub for pharmaceutical logistics for all southern European countries," said Fabrizio Iacobacci, president of PharmacomItalia, an association of players specialising in pharmaceutical logistics, speaking in 2022 during a "Working Tour" organised on this theme in Fiumicino. In 2023, Italian exports of pharmaceutical products to China grew spectacularly in the first quarter, as the end of the ‘Zero Covid’ policy led to a sharp rise in infections. Rome airport has clearly benefited from this specific surge in flows.
Milan and Rome combined represent 80% of all traffic. Far behind them, come four other airports registering traffic over 20,000 tonnes each, according to data from Assaeroporti. Bologna in 3rd position followed by Venice with a relatively stable market share despite a 0.5% drop compared to 2022 with some 47,000 tons of goods. Pisa airport (north central) recorded the biggest drop in comparison with the previous year (-13.3%), Brescia airport in the north of the country also recorded a large drop losing 9.5%.
Milan-Malpensa, the foreign trade hub
Malpensa Cargo City, the cargo zone of Milan-Malpensa Airport, is a key hub for the Italian foreign trade production system of the north of the country. It handles 46% of Italy's import volumes by air and 54% of its export volumes by the same means. In value, imports and exports that passed through Malpensa totalled 57.7 billion in 2023, up 2.5 billion compared to the previous year. This represents about 4.6% of Italian foreign goods trade, which in 2023 amounted to 1,241 billion euros, says SEA, the airport's managing company.
Malpensa notably occupies an important place in the furniture, fashion, and mechanics sectors, holding a respective share of 16.8%, 15.3% and 7.5% in total Italian exports for these segments. Last year, goods that passed through this airport accounted for 50% of all Italian exports to the North American and Far East markets in the fashion and clothing sector, and more than a third of exports from the furniture and furnishings sector to these same areas. Malpensa finally handles a quarter of exports from the mechanics sector to East Asian countries.
An Italian flag State in decline
According to the Bank of Italy study, the market share of Italian air cargo carriers fell to 13.8% in 2022, compared to 15.6% in 2019, 19.2% in 2012 and 34.7% in 2022. This decline is linked to the setbacks of the national airline Alitalia, which shut up shop in October 2021, drowning in debt. At the time, a smaller entity succeeded it, ITA Airways, offering much more modest cargo capacities than Alitalia.
In 2022, the Italian government decided to privatise ITA Airways. The Italian-Swiss shipping company MSC presented a joint offer with the Lufthansa group in January 2023, but it finally abandoned the project, and it was the Lufthansa group alone that won the bid.
However, MSC has not totally abandoned its position in air cargo. Like its major maritime competitors, Maersk and CMA CGM, it launched its own airline, MSC Air Cargo, in 2022. In August 2023, MSC then announced the acquisition of a majority stake in AlisCargo, an all-cargo airline founded in 2019 and based in Milan. “This transaction is yet another step to further developing MSC Air Cargo operations and creates a European gateway and transit point for MSC’s air cargo solutions,” the company said in a statement.
Since then, MSC Air Cargo has launched direct flights between Milan-Malpensa and Tokyo. “MSC Air Cargo is in the early stages of development, and we have plans for significant investments to build and create more air transport solutions designed for products that need to reach their final destination at greater efficiency and as a top priority, including pharmaceuticals, perishable goods, or even automotive items. We want to enable the Italian market with even more options and ability to do business with their trading partners supporting national export,” said Jannie Davel, Vice President of MSC Air Cargo, at the inauguration of the Milan-Tokyo line. Thanks to the profits recorded during Covid in the container shipping business, MSC now has colossal means to invest. Companies flying the Italian flag could therefore see business blooming in the coming years.
Photo credit: Milan-Malpensa Airport
