Do you know the characteristics and functions of international air freight? Let's find out.

Although air freight started late, it developed very rapidly, especially favored by modern enterprise managers. One of the reasons is that it has many incomparable advantages over other modes of transportation. To sum up, the main features of air freight are:

First, the transportation speed is fast.

Since the birth of the aviation industry, air transportation has been known for its speed. Until now, the plane is still the most flexible means of transportation. The economic cruising speed of ordinary jet planes is mostly around 850 ~ 900 kilometers per hour, and the fast transportation greatly shortens the transportation time of goods. It can be said that the rapid development and dense air transportation network in the world will enable us to open up long-distance markets for fresh goods that we are eager to reach, so as to cope with the ever-changing market conditions, enhance the competitiveness of goods and make consumers enjoy it.

At present, among China's imported goods, precision high-tech products such as communication equipment, computers, precision parts and electronic products in complete sets of equipment are mainly used for air transportation; Export commodities mainly include clothing, silk, cotton knitwear, handicrafts, seafood agricultural and sideline products, flowers, fruits and vegetables, electronic and mechanical products, etc.

Second, it is not limited by ground conditions.

Air transport takes advantage of the natural passage in the sky and is not limited by geographical conditions. It is very suitable for inland areas with bad ground conditions and inconvenient transportation, which is conducive to the export of local resources and promotes the development of local economy.

Air transport links the local area with the world, and it radiates widely to the outside world. Moreover, air transportation occupies less land than road transportation and railway transportation, which is undoubtedly very suitable for developing external transportation in areas with less land and small area.

Third, safety and accuracy.

Compared with other modes of transportation, air transportation is safer. 1997, global * * * airlines carried out180,000 flights, and only 1 1 had serious accidents, with the accident rate of about one in three million. The transportation management system of airlines is also relatively perfect, and the damage rate of goods is low. It is safer to transport goods by air container.

Four, save packaging, insurance, interest and other expenses.

Due to the use of air transportation, the transit time of goods is short and the turnover speed is fast, so the inventory of enterprises can be reduced accordingly. On the one hand, it is beneficial to fund recovery and reduce interest expenses; On the other hand, it can also reduce the storage cost of enterprises. Moreover, due to the safety and accuracy of air cargo transportation, less cargo damage, and lower insurance costs, compared with other modes of transportation, air cargo transportation has simple packaging and lower packaging costs, which reduces the operating costs and increases the income of enterprises. In addition, due to the high speed of air transportation, short turnover period of goods and less damage to goods, the expenses of packaging, insurance and interest of goods can be reduced.

Of course, air transportation also has its own limitations, mainly in the fact that the transportation cost of air freight is higher than other modes of transportation and it is not suitable for low-value goods; The capacity of air carrier-aircraft-cabin is limited, which has certain restrictions on the transportation of large goods or a large number of goods; Aircraft flight safety is easily affected by bad weather. But generally speaking, with the wider application of emerging technologies, products tend to be thinner, lighter, shorter, smaller and more valuable, and managers pay more attention to the timeliness and reliability of transportation, so air freight will have greater development space.

The appearance and function of air freight forwarder

To import and export goods by air transport (referred to as air transport), certain procedures need to be handled, such as sales, receipt, booking, document preparation, customs declaration and delivery of export goods before they are handed over to airlines at the airport of origin; Imported goods are received, received, declared, delivered or transshipped by airlines at the destination airport. Airlines are generally not responsible for this kind of business, so the industry specializing in this kind of business-air freight forwarding industry came into being, and its main business is air freight forwarding company.

Air freight business can be divided into two forms: through air freight agents or by shippers and shippers directly with airlines. As a bridge and link between the consignor and the airline, the air freight forwarding company can replace the consignor as the consignor's agent to consign or pick up the goods from the airline. It can also be an agent of an airline to receive the goods instead of the airline and issue the airline's general waybill and its own sub-waybill.

The reason why air freight forwarders can come into being and develop rapidly is that their services can bring convenience and benefits to both shippers and airlines.

First of all, most air freight forwarding companies are very familiar with transportation links and related rules and regulations, and have extensive and close ties with civil aviation, customs, commodity inspection, transportation and other departments, and have the relevant conditions for handling transportation procedures. At the same time, air freight forwarding companies have branches or agents all over the world, which can contact in time and control the whole process of cargo transportation. Airlines are only responsible for transportation from one airport to another. Therefore, it is more convenient to entrust an air freight forwarding company to handle the transportation of import and export goods than to entrust customers to handle it directly with airlines.

Secondly, the main business of air freight forwarders is centralized consignment, that is, multiple batches of goods shipped separately are combined into a whole batch of goods, which are shipped to the same site with the same general waybill, and their local agents are responsible for receiving the goods and distributing them to the actual consignee after customs declaration. This centralized transportation mode can win lower freight rates from airlines, and both agents and shippers can benefit from this service.

As far as airlines are concerned, they can also benefit from the services of agency companies. Although the airline has to pay a certain fee to the agency, the agency has organized a batch of goods for it, contracted a large number of customers, and concentrated the goods of thousands of households for consignment, saving a lot of manpower, material resources and time, thus helping it to further explore the air transport market. At the same time, the consignee and consignor can get convenient and fast value-added services from the freight forwarder, which can save costs, improve efficiency and enhance their competitiveness in this industry.

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