IATA: Growth of e-commerce not enough to overcome air cargo headwinds

IATA reported (29-Nov-2019) e-commerce has been a key growth market for air cargo operators over recent years, but the share of online sales remains relatively small, despite its rapid growth rate. While the ratio of global trade to industrial production has been trending sideways since the global financial crisis, online sales have been rapidly increasing as a share of total retail sales. IATA stated: "E-commerce is certainly becoming an increasingly important part of the operations for many cargo carriers, but at this stage the volume of online sales simply isn't large enough to single handedly reverse the fortunes of the air cargo industry and overcome the current headwinds". [more - original PR]