The group expands Central Asia Hub
DHL Express executives see a strong growth in cargo movements between India and China as the two countries continue to expand bilateral trade, Press Trust of India reported on 21 Nov 2017.
“Given the expected rise in international e-commerce and intra-Asian trade, we see shipment volume between India and China increasing significantly,” said Ken Allen, chief executive officer of DHL Express.
“We see strong growth potential within and outside the Indian market. DHL Express, as such, has well positioned its hubs in Asia for handling the growing volume in and out of India,” added Ken Lee, CEO of DHL Express Asia Pacific.
The Central Asia Hub is located within a five-hour flight time to India, allowing DHL to serve half one of the world’s most populous nations.
DHL Express has recently announced a Euro335 million expansion at the Central Asia Hub in Hong Kong where it recorded a 5.3 per cent growth in cargo movements between China and India in the first nine months this year.
Lee sees bigger developments in the Indian market, especially the momentum of growth in e-commerce following implementation of Goods and Services Tax and the digitization supporting online-dealings.
“GST, digitization and e-commerce are set to bring about a significant change in the way Indian market operates. Online orders will generate a bigger volume of cargo both for product deliveries to consumers and movement of documentations related to infrastructure development in the country,” said Lee.
As a group, Deutsche Post DHL Group has an extensive service-based infrastructure laid out in India with ongoing expansion. But the global group is also viewing potential of India generating large volume of export-oriented goods and documentations, said the executives.
The CAH expansion is part of DHL Express’ ongoing strategies to strengthen hubs at Shanghai, Singapore and Bangkok, linking its Asia Pacific markets globally.
When put in operations in Q1 2022, the annual throughput of the expanded CAH will be doubled to 1.06 million tonnes per annum of cargo, or 125,000 pieces of shipments per hour. Fii-news.com
