While airlines the world over clamber to avoid bankruptcy by focusing their operations on cargo, a new operator in China has just been launched that shines a light on the country’s ambitions for an “Aerial Silk Road” that will join the Belt & Road Initiative.
On 26 April, in Henan Province’s capital city of Zhengzhou, Central Airlines (中州航空; Zhongzhou Aviation) held a ceremony marking its operation certification. The cargo-only airline is the first and only airline to start up during the coronavirus outbreak.
Not that the decision to make the airline a cargo-only operation had anything to do with the epidemic. Its roots had been sown some time ago. The operator took delivery of its inaugural aircraft in mid November of last year, a Boeing 737-300(F) formerly in service with Shanghai-based Suparna Airlines.
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Central Airlines’ base of operations in Zhengzhou is also far from a coincidence. As the first Comprehensive Airport Economic Experiment Zone approved by the State, Zhengzhou Xinzheng International Airport is focused on building an international cargo hub.
As long ago as June, 2017, General Secretary, Xi Jinping, when meeting with Prime Minister of Luxembourg, Xavier Bethel, clearly pointed out that the two sides should deepen cooperation in finance and production capacity within the framework of the Belt and Road Initiative, reported Science and Technology Daily.
In September of that year, the Henan Provincial Government issued the Zhengzhou-Luxembourg Silk Road construction plan, proposing the development concept of such a dual hub. Dubbed the Aerial Silk Road, the Zhengzhou-Luxembourg link as an aerial economic corridor connecting East Asia and Europe, would in effect be a blueprint for the development of the Aerial Silk Road.
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More recently, on 24 March of this year, China’s Premier, Li Keqiang, chaired an executive meeting of the State Council to deploy and further enhance China’s international air cargo capacity, notes the story reporting the Central Airlines certification on its website.
Central Airlines is owned by two directors of the company, Zhan Yang and Song Shengli, together with Henan Zhongzhou Tengfei International Freight Forwarding Co.
The operator plans to initially serve cities all over China with air cargo and mail flights from Zhengzhou, moving on to develop an international network as its fleet of aircraft grows.
