There are some interesting meetings this week in Leipzig, Germany, as The International Transport Forum (ITF), an intergovernmental organization with 54 member countries, which acts as a think tank for transport policy, holds its Annual Summit of transport ministers.

     ITF is the only global body that covers all transport modes, but what caught our eye were the interesting speakers, including Sarah Hunter, head of Public Policy at Google. Hunter has worked closely with several product teams as they develop new technologies, from self-driving cars to life sciences to Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) and the balloon-powered Internet (Project Loon).
     UPS Europe Region Transportation District Manager Al Bedran is also at ITF as part of the lone panel dedicated to air cargo titled “Aviation in a world of evolving supply chains.”
     Bedran began his UPS career in 1979 as a part-time package handler in the North Florida District, and as they say, he knows this business inside and out.
     Mr. Bedran joins Dorothee Bär, German Parliamentary state secretary at the Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure; Vladimir Zubkov, vice-president, Relations with International Organizations, Volga-Dnepr; and Glynn Hughes, head of Cargo, IATA.

     There is also a two-hour tour of the operations of CargoBeamer, a European transport system consisting of special wagons and terminals with cargo handling that allow all non-craneable semi-trailers to be shifted from road to rail.
     “Freight traffic on European roads is forecast to grow by 75 percent until 2025," said Hans-Juergen Weidemann, CEO of CargoBeamer.
     “CargoBeamer has the potential to shift major amounts of cargo traffic efficiently (and keep environmentally-friendly) from road to rail."
     “With the support of the European Commission, CargoBeamer is constructing an initial east-west connection from BeNeLux via NRW, Saxony, Poland, and Lithuania to Latvia with its cooperation partners.
     “Starting from Calais, CargoBeamer is also planning operations for a major European freight route with high traffic volumes: a north/south route to Italy via France, Germany, and Switzerland,” the company said.
     ITF concludes on Friday, but the speeches and plenty of pictures will be available here.
Geoffrey

With the final induction of USAiways, American Airlines becomes the world’s largest airline. CEO Doug Parker spoke about the Emirates service from New York to Milan:
I know enough about this business to know you can't launch A380s from Milan to JFK.
I don't care what your cost structure is, there's no possible way you can generate enough revenue on the route to pay the cost of flying that airplane over."

   The “flights freeze” taken by Dutch lawmakers, which stops any further new services into Netherlands by Gulf carriers, is added to moves already taken by Germany and France to freeze the allocation of new routes to Emirates, Etihad, and Qatar.
   President Captain Lee Moak of the U.S. organization “Americans for Fair Skies” (AFF), said:
   “Like the French and the Germans, the Dutch have also seen the evidence.”
   AFS has asked the U.S. Government “to likewise freeze new route applications from Gulf carriers into the U.S. until issues (including questions of unfair subsidies) have been sorted out,” Lee Moak said.
   “To be clear: we support Open Skies 100 percent. Any suggestion to the contrary is an attempt to distract from the true narrative. Our call for government action is directed only to two cases where foreign governments are engaged in predatory practices to distort the marketplace in favor of their state-owned airlines, which runs counter to Open Skies.
   “These are not allegations.
   “These are facts.
   “And the subsidies by the United Arab Emirates and Qatar to their state-subsidized airlines are the worst form of protectionism,” Lee Moak said.

     In an air cargo industry looking for new markets, return on investment, and less time on the ground, the World Trade Organization (WTO) initiative toward acceptance of a new Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA) is underway amidst hopes of ratification by the WTO’s 10th Ministerial Conference in Nairobi this December 15-18, 2015.
     To date, four of the 160 WTO members—Hong Kong (China), Singapore, the United States, and Mauritius—have secured domestic acceptance of the TFA, which was concluded at the WTO’s 2013 Bali Ministerial Conference.
     But two-thirds of the WTO’s 160 members will need to ratify the TFA in order for the agreement to enter into force.
     Sources say the big hang up to securing acceptance is amongst members, where local politics and domestic legislative challenges need to be overcome.
     Several members have already told WTO they are not in a position to ensure ratification by the Nairobi meeting scheduled for later this year.
     There is no deadline for securing the two-thirds threshold.

IATA Jumps In

     The International Air Transport Association said it supports countries implementing TFA, the World Trade Organization's Trade Facilitation Agreement, and put up a MOU agreement signed with the United Nations.
     “Aligning regulation and procedures with global standards and best practices has the potential to deliver major efficiency gains.
     “Together with UNECE, we will work with developing countries to simplify their procedures and enhance their facilities,” IATA said.

Long Flight To Speed Things Up

     Already two years underway, the idea to move ahead with TFA was concluded at the WTO’s 2013 Bali Ministerial Conference. The TFA contains provisions for expediting the movement, release, and clearance of goods, including goods in transit.
     It also sets out measures for effective cooperation between customs and other appropriate authorities on trade facilitation and customs compliance issues.
     It further contains provisions for technical assistance and capacity building in this area.
     The Protocol of Amendment inserting the TFA into Annex 1A of the WTO Agreement was subsequently adopted by the General Council on November 27, 2014.
     This in turn opened the door for members to formally accept the TFA through their domestic legislative procedures.
     More information on trade facilitation and the TFA can be found at here.
Geoffrey

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