Digitalization and sustainability top agenda at IATA World Cargo Symposium

February 10, 2024 in Business, Companies, Transport, Travel & Tourism by Editor

Digitalization and Sustainability as well as Safety and Security, will top the agenda at the IATA World Cargo Symposium that is slated to run from March 12-14, 2024 in Hong Kong. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) released the agenda this week which also, highlighted the industry figures that will be speaking at this year’s edition of the event.

Ronald Lam, Cathay Group Chief Executive Officer, Willie Walsh, IATA’s Director General, Marie Owens Thomsen, IATA’s SVP Sustainability and Chief Economist, and Brendan Sullivan, IATA’s Global Head of Cargo will set the scene for the conference with keynote addresses. They will be followed by air cargo experts, including Tom Owen, the Director of Cargo at Cathay Pacific, Michael Steen, Chief Executive Officer Atlas Air, Vivian Lau, Chief Executive Jardine Aviation Services Group, Kirsten de Bruijn, Executive Vice President Cargo for WestJet and Marco Bloeman, Managing Director, Accenture and Head of Accenture Cargo.

“Air cargo is an unsung hero of the global economy. In normal times, it delivers some 35pc of the value of goods traded across borders. In the pandemic, air cargo brought medical supplies and vaccines to where they were needed. And today it is providing a vital transport alternative for some products as Red Sea shipping lanes face geopolitical uncertainty,” says Brendan Sullivan adding:

“When air cargo’s global leaders gather in Hong Kong for the IATA World Cargo Symposium, ensuring the future reliability and growth of this critical sector will be top of mind with an agenda focused on sustainability, digitalization, safety and security.”

The event’s overall theme of driving sustainable and inclusive growth will be supported by three tracks: • Sustainability, which will include sessions on tracking progress towards net zero carbon emissions by 2050, ESG reporting, optimizing operations for environmental performance, reducing single use plastics, and circular strategies for Unit Load Device (ULD) components.• Digitalization, which will include sessions on data driven strategies to improve performance and reduce costs, achieving the efficiencies of OneRecord, and the potential for generative AI in air cargo.• Safety & Security, which will include sessions on Annex 18 Regulatory oversight of freight forwarders/handling agents for dangerous goods shipments, fire containment strategies for lithium battery shipments, ULD airworthiness, latest developments for the safety of live animal shipments, implications of an integrated risk management framework.Workshops Inclusive strategies for managing the people needed to lead and drive the future of air cargo will be the focus of two key WCS workshops:• Building the next generation of talent at the Future Air Cargo Executives Summit (FACES)
• The benefits of competency-based training through IATA’s Competency-Based Training and Assessment Center (CBTA Center) and how it helps to improve workplace safety and performance. Additional workshops include, improving performance on key market segments using IATA Center of Excellence for Independent Validators (CEIV) programs (CEIV Pharma, CEIV Live Animals, CEIV Lithium Batteries and CEIV Fresh). Another workshop will look at how IATA’s Cargo Solutions are assisting the industry in decision making and cargo compliance, towards improving safety and efficiency; and how air cargo billing and settlement can be enhanced using the new CASSLink.