Is airfreight losing its bloom?

Airfreight is fast losing traction in the transport of perishable goods thanks to recent cool chain innovations by shipping lines. When fragile, high-demand commodities such as flowers arrive at their destination in a better condition after 28 days on the high seas versus the three-day airfreight shipment, there is clearly something amiss, says Jeroen van der Hulst, CEO of quality and cool chain management company, FlowerWatch. “The heart of the problem here is that the airfreight industry is not able to protect and ensure the integrity of the cold chain as there is no set industry standard,” said Van der Hulst during a discussion hosted by Amsterdam's Schiphol Cargo Airport at the Air Cargo 2015 conference held in Johannesburg late last month. Van der Hulst – who recently completed an industry study on the freshness of flowers being shipped out of East Africa to The Netherlands via sea and air – demonstrated that the flowers could survive up to 32 days at sea because seafreight was better able to control its cold chain and keep the temperature steady at around 6 degrees celsius. “The airfreight temperatures on the other hand ranged from -2 degrees to up to 45 degrees and the flowers were subjected to far more handling.” He said there were up to 17 different points along the airfreight supply chain, starting at the farm of origin and ending with the product on the supermarket shelf. “If there were improved and benchmarked industry standards imposed at all those points, the industry would not lose out to another mode of transport as the demand is too high for this kind of commodity.” He says only 30-40% of flights out of Africa meet the cold chain standard of 0 to 4 degrees celsius which will prolong the life of a perishable product. Johan Hulleman, head of quality assurance and corporate social responsibility at the Jumbo Supermarket group in The Netherlands, told FTW on the sidelines of the conference that while he did not want to switch to seafreight as he needed the immediacy of airfreight – especially during peak seasons – he would consider it if it came with an improved quality guarantee. “For example, ahead of Valentine’s Day this year, I needed 800 boxes of roses from Kenya. But I ordered 1 400 because I needed to meet the increased consumer demand with a good product,” he said, adding that his supermarket group guaranteed that their flowers would last for at least seven days after they were purchased in-store “We need our logistics partners to help us meet those demands or soon we could both be out of business.” CAPTION Flowers from all over the world, including Africa, in an Amsterdam warehouse, ready to be shipped out to the rest of Europe. Photo: FlowerWatch