During the Fruit Logistica in Berlin, Air Cargo Belgium was a first-time exhibitor. “We are a new non-profit organisation that strives to further evolve BRUcargo to become an even more appealing and successful logistics platform,” Frank van Gelder, chairman of the fresh working group, sums up the activities.
Working group Fresh
Frank indicates that they are looking after the interests of the entire air freight community with this. The stakeholders have been brought together in working groups according to theme. Within those working groups, a number of focus points and projects have been defined that we worked out, which is for the good of the freight community. Each working group has an experienced chairman who is supported by a junior. For the Fresh working group, these are Frank van Gelder and Maarten van Cauwenberghe. “This is the working group dedicated to all perishable-related developments and trends in the fresh produce sector. The main objectives of this working group are promoting the perishables’ footprint in Brussels on the one hand, and further developing our airport to a European perishables gateway in order to be a reference on the other hand.”
Activities of the working group
The working group Fresh is currently involved with various matters. “We have planned a meeting with FAVV, together with the AVI working group. It concerns promoting a smooth cooperation that is also coupled with operational improvements of all Fresh (and AVI)-related proceedings. Additionally, we also have the intention to start a clear, all-round SOP - Standard Operating System - to promote the quality of the settlement of Fresh products. And then there are a number of disruptive and innovative projects in the pipeline to redraw the current model of perishable air freight and logistics. Furthermore, we want to help exporters and importers proactively in order to quicker and better follow through on compliance and regulations in practice. So, in short, we are striving for a central approach of the physical perishable flow in order to bundle efficiency and expertise in a strong fresh product in air freight.”
Members Fresh working group
“All companies that are members of ACB can participate in the Fresh working group meetings, provided that they can contribute the necessary expertise and contributions. At this moment, the members include handling agent Swissport, WFS and Aviapartner, but Brussels Airline Cargo, Adelantex, Brussels Airport Company and Sotracom are also present at these meetings. Furthermore, a representative of the FAVV and BAFI is also present at these meetings, and an importer of Van Laethem has joined the working group as well. We therefore have a good mix of handling agents, airlines, shippers, forwarders and importers.” According to Frank, the idea of the cooperation had been floating around for a while already, but the time was ripe now. “In the past, there was no structural cooperation. Anyway, Brussels has always had a strong share in the field of Fresh and there is a close connection with Africa.”
More air freight to BRUcargo
The organisation hopes to draw more air freight to BRUcargo in time. “This can be achieved by working with the working group in order to optimise and qualitatively improve all perishables handling activities. To this end, we have a number of trumps that could make people choose Brussels. First and foremost, we have a central location: by means of an extensive trucking network, we can very quickly reach the cores of European consumer markets.”
Short throughput time
Frank indicates that they are a compact freight community. “And this definitely has advantages. The handling activities on the ground are very near to ‘airside,’ meaning temperature sensitive goods can quickly be brought to cold stores for further treatment and inspections. So a short throughput time, meaning quality of the goods can continue to be guaranteed. Compared to other airports, we do not handle the most tonnage of perishables, but the freight coming through here is always high-quality. Another advantage is the fact that we, as an overarching air freight organisation, work together in order to improve with all our stakeholders. We do this from a community level, which means that we can realise more than one individual company or other airports that do not have similar organisations.”
Recently started
Air Cargo Belgium was officially founded on 18 April 2016, and the non-profit organisation has been recognised as an innovative company network since 1 September 2017, when it also started operationally. Air Cargo Belgium is supported in this by cluster policy VLAIO: the Flemish Agency for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Within their cluster policy, they are recognised as an innovative company network that focuses on cooperation between companies.