• Investment World
• eWorld
• Catalyst
• Mentor
• Life
• Canvas
• Praxis
• Urban Pulse
• Brand Quest

Stocks

• Quotes
• SE Diary
• Scoreboard
• Open-End Mutual Fund

Port Info

• Ships in Ports
  
  

Archives

• Yesterday
• Datewise
• Resources

Group Sites

• The Hindu
• Business Line
• The Sportstar
• Frontline
• The Hindu eBooks
• The Hindu Images

Our Bureau

Coimbatore , April 27

THE first exclusive freighter to link Coimbatore with Colombo — the SriLankan Airlines (SriLankan Cargo) — is expected to rely on perishables and garment shipments from Coimbatore and the fabric imports from the Far East by Tirupur's garment units.

These would form the throughput for the SriLankan Cargo flight which will shorten the transit time in the region, according to the officials of the SriLankan Cargo and Poppys Global, the airlines' local partner here which will be the general sales agent for the SriLankan Cargo.

The freighter operation will provide same-day connectivity to West Asia and Malaysia and to Europe with just a 30-hour transit for the shipments booked from Coimbatore, said Mr A. Sakthivel, Chairman of the Poppys group, who introduced the new freighter facility at a gathering of shippers, Custom house agents, cargo handlers/freight forwarders here.

The twice-a-week freighter from SriLankan Airlines, an AN-12F aircraft, will have a 17-tonne cargo capacity and operate here on Wednesday and Saturday.

With same-day connectivity to the Gulf and South-East Asian destinations, including Colombo, the freighter would be an ideal medium to carry flowers and vegetables from Coimbatore to these destinations, said Mr Nalin Rodrigo, head of cargo, SriLankan Airlines. The shorter lead time the shippers routing their air cargo through the SriLankan Cargo here stand to get and the easy clearances of the shipments facilitated by the smaller airport of the size of the Coimbatore will also go into increasing the volume of shipments.

Mr Rodrigo hopes the weekly volume of export cargo is likely to be 30-40 tonnes and expects an equal quantity of imports. "Already there has been imports of textile fabrics from the Far-East, especially the polyester and blended fabrics from Indonesia which is being used in garment production in Tirupur." This will signify a further growth in volume said Mr Sakthivel who is also optimistic that with the anticipated volume growth, the freighter may become a daily service sooner.

SriLankan Airlines, which has originally scheduled the launch of cargo flight operation from here on Wednesday, has rescheduled its cargo flight operation launch to May 4 and according to officials here that the final touches in ground handling works had necessitated the postponement of the launch.

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page

Stories in this Section
Airbus wants CVC to look into AI's acquisition deal

Copyright © 2005, The Hindu Business Line. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu Business Line