Chinese carrier, Sichuan Airlines has launched a cargo flight between Chengdu Shuangliu International Airport in the Sichuan Province of China to Budapest Ferenc Liszt International Airport (BUD).
In the announcement, BUD noted that the airline would operate three flights a week using an Airbus A330 passenger-to-freighter (P2F) aircraft.
"The new connection is another important step towards Budapest Airport's regional leadership role in air cargo, which is also of key importance for the Hungarian economy," the airport added.
The first regular cargo flight to Western China in the history of Budapest Airport was launched on August 20.
In addition to general import-export cargo, the flight will also focus on e-commerce, making the new flight capacity a lucrative trade connection for both Hungary and China.
Increased cargo demand
"As a result of the excellent joint work with our cargo community, Budapest Airport's role as a gateway for air cargo in Central and Eastern Europe is growing rapidly, especially to Asia, including China," said René Droese, the chief development officer of Budapest Airport.
"We see increasing demand for new cargo routes and for increased capacity on existing routes, and we plan to expand our cargo connections, besides Asia, to Western Europe and the transatlantic region as well," Droese added, welcoming Sichuan Airlines to Budapest.
Peter Xu, freighter station manager of Sichuan Airlines, noted that the new connection supports the success of the "air Silk Road" — as part of the Belt and Road initiative.
"Sichuan Airlines' cargo network offers integrated, customized and professional logistics services for both Hungarian and Chinese companies, and the new flight will surely become an important logistics channel for the export of high-quality Hungarian goods to Chinese cities and vice versa," Xu added.
The volume of air cargo in Budapest broke all previous records to reach 194,000 tons by the end of last year, an increase of 5.8% compared to 2021 and 44% compared to 2019.
The growth continued in March this year: the volume of air cargo exceeded the average monthly cargo volume of the previous year by 4.3% and 2019 by 49.3%.
BUD noted that this is "exceptional" compared to cargo volumes at other European airports, as the global economic slowdown has also caused a downturn in air cargo.
"It is important to add that the record cargo volume was achieved with fewer aircraft movements, with the number of cargo flights down 11.5% last year compared to 2021," the European airport added.
BUD opened BUD Cargo City in 2020 and has expanded handling building and warehouse capacities.
It said that the expansion will increase the airport's annual cargo capacity from 250,000 to 300,000 tons.
