newstodate.aero
Sep 06, 2017 (newstodate): Lithuania's fourth international airport, Siauliai Airport is keen to grow its freighter cargo volumes and commercial business.
-We are now in the process of finalizing a tender process concerning rent of land on the airport premises, and we have had promising response, says Arturas Jurkevicius, Siauliai Airport Head of Grand Handling Division and also Head of Siauliai Airport Commercial Unit.
-We are now evaluating offers from two European and one Middle East participants, and a result will be announced by the end of this month. The vision is to attract investors to lease land for building an MRO infrastructure as well as other airport-related facilities.
-At the same time we are also working hard to attract commercial air cargo to Siauliai, and we are currently seeing one weekly freighter flight from Turkey carrying e-trade goods including Chinese textiles and other commodities for transfer to the European markets.
-The flights are operated with a mix of Ukrainean, Russian and Turkish aircraft flying in some 20-40 tonnes of cargo per week, but it has been difficult during certain periods because of political issues in Russia and Turkey. Anyhow, we expect to be handling some 5,000 tonnes in 2017, roughly on a par with 2016.
-While the flights are driven by imports, we are still working hard to find also exports to balance the operation. This is a most challenging task, also after the launch of Turkish Cargo's weekly operations at Riga Airport supported by efficient cargo agents.
-But we are doing our best and happy to see our projects moving, says Mr Jurkevicius.
-We are now in the process of finalizing a tender process concerning rent of land on the airport premises, and we have had promising response, says Arturas Jurkevicius, Siauliai Airport Head of Grand Handling Division and also Head of Siauliai Airport Commercial Unit.
-We are now evaluating offers from two European and one Middle East participants, and a result will be announced by the end of this month. The vision is to attract investors to lease land for building an MRO infrastructure as well as other airport-related facilities.
-At the same time we are also working hard to attract commercial air cargo to Siauliai, and we are currently seeing one weekly freighter flight from Turkey carrying e-trade goods including Chinese textiles and other commodities for transfer to the European markets.
-The flights are operated with a mix of Ukrainean, Russian and Turkish aircraft flying in some 20-40 tonnes of cargo per week, but it has been difficult during certain periods because of political issues in Russia and Turkey. Anyhow, we expect to be handling some 5,000 tonnes in 2017, roughly on a par with 2016.
-While the flights are driven by imports, we are still working hard to find also exports to balance the operation. This is a most challenging task, also after the launch of Turkish Cargo's weekly operations at Riga Airport supported by efficient cargo agents.
-But we are doing our best and happy to see our projects moving, says Mr Jurkevicius.