October saw a 1.3% rise in cargo tonnage at Hong Kong International Airport to 324,000 tonnes, the first monthly positive growth since August last year, the Airport Authority says. Passenger throughput and air traffic movements fell 3.7% to 3.9 million and 7.8% to 23,945 on October last year.

Transshipment traffic also shrank 8% due to Mainland-Taiwan cargo diversion to scheduled direct flights across the Taiwan Strait. Tight capacity from Hong Kong due to strong demand and reduced freighter capacity also made transshipment carriage less attractive to airlines.

Export volume recorded a 0.1% rise year-on-year, ending months of negative growth. Import volume performed exceptionally well in October, up 13%.

Hong Kong resident traffic rose 20% while visitor numbers dropped 4%. Transfer and transit traffic fell 18% due to the weak performance of the Mainland and Taiwan markets.

The recent traffic figures continue to indicate signs of stabilisation, particularly on the air cargo side, authority Chief Executive Officer Stanley Hui said, adding pre-Christmas stock replenishment has caused a sudden air cargo boom in the region and momentum is building up to the year-end seasonal upturn, which hopefully is a sign of market recovery.

The airport handled 38.2 million passengers and 2.7 million tonnes of cargo, down 6.3% and 13.4% from January to October. Aircraft movements fell 7.9% to 231,800.

On a rolling 12-month basis there were 46 million passengers, 281,345 aircraft movements and 3.2 million tonnes of cargo volume, down 6.2%, 6.9% and 15.2%.