AS NATO troops withdraw from Afghanistan this year, there will be a heavy demand for airlift out of Afghanistan, say US air freight carriers, reports Rosewell, Georgia's Air Cargo World.

    "Some of our B747-400F flights are now beginning to return with full loads of what the US military term 'retrograde' traffic to Dubai, from where it can easily be transported by ocean," said Larry Coyne, CEO of UK-based Coyne Airways.

    But this will be largely an American business because other NATO partners have military aircraft carry military supplies while Pentagon has long used commercial carriers such a Coyne Airways.

    "This equipment is far too valuable and sophisticated to leave to rust," Mr Coyne said. "Besides, the US Defence Department has become very wise and savvy to making the best use of the commercial market to provide its logistic support at competitive rates."

    The US Defence Department has an annual transportation budget of US$3 billion, 70 per cent of which is allocated to the private sector. Contrast that allotment with the UK's Ministry of Defence, which insists that it directly handle all defence-related transport business, a policy shared by most other European defence departments.

    "It is a policy you could possibly understand if it related to a strategic build-up in a war zone. But we are now talking about a much more measured withdrawal - yet they insist on sticking to the same policy," Mr Coyne said. "Instead of going to the forwarders or operators like us, they go to the charter market and pay through the nose for each single charter."

    These charters, said Mr Coyne, are often military C-17s, which cost 300 per cent more to fly than commercial freighters.

(Source:http://www.shippingonline.cn/news/newsContent.asp?id=22556)