“We discussed the airplane transport with a particular focus on cargo. Cargo at our Malpensa airport has had exceptional results because it grew by more than 36% compared to 2019 and more than 45% compared to 2020, the year of the pandemic. A circumstance that has led the airport to accept around 70% of the goods in transit at Italian airports, exceeding the 740.000 tonnes foreseen in the estimates of the Masterplan between 2024 and 2025". He said it Alessandro Spada, president of Assolombarda, during the conference “The recovery starts from Malpensa – Air Cargo, strategic support for industries and logistics”, organized by the Union of Industrialists of the province of Varese and Assolombarda, in collaboration with Sea, the company that manages the Malpensa and Linate airports.
"The Malpensa airport it is a fundamental port of call for the whole country, because it manages 75% of the entire cargo traffic in Italy and it is therefore important to discuss what the potential is to be able to consolidate it and make it more and more a European hub that can serve the whole country,” added Spada.
Spada of Assolombarda: "A mistake to exclude airports from the PNRR"
"Given the objective value of the sector, we have many doubts about the choice not to provide resources within the PNRR for the development of airports", underlined the president of Assolombarda, adding that "the need for rethinking international supply chains they cannot do without a fundamental player such as Malpensa. It is, moreover, an access point and a fundamental junction for the global market, which must be adequately exploited in order to consolidate it as a relevant European hub. The airport is crucial in this difficult economic situation characterized by the Ukrainian conflict, which urges us to start a profound review and revision of the global value chains and international exchange dynamics, placing air transport even more at the center", he concluded Spade.
Grassi of the Industrial Union of Varese: "Malpensa fundamental production asset"
“Malpensa is an asset that generates around 10 billion euros in annual added value and employs around 40 people. So we cannot fail to consider this important productive asset as certainly one of the main ones in Lombardy, if not at an Italian level", said the President of the Varese Industrial Union, Roberto Grassi.
“We cannot afford – he continued – the bottleneck of the activities of the Malpensa Cargo City, especially in this phase in which companies are facing the challenge of repositioning in global value chains and in the reorganization of international production chains".
Then the appeal to the political-institutional system: “we ask you to support the Masterplan of Malpensa and the relative enlargement and growth of the Cargo Area, so fundamental for the future of our manufacturing. We applaud the excellent agreement reached recently, on this point, in the Region, thanks to the commitment of everyone: local administrations, the Lombardy Region, SEA and the social partners. An agreement that will now allow the Masterplan to arrive on the table of the Government with a broad consensus built on the territory. It is proof that economic development, environmental balance and social protection can all come under a single vision of development. Supporting Malpensa means implementing industrial policy for the country. If today we don't make a choice in favor of Malpensa, tomorrow we shouldn't be surprised to be a country on the margins of international development trajectories".
Sea's Brunini: "Cargo market strategic asset for the country"
“The cargo market is a strategic asset for the whole territory and for the country, as demonstrated during the pandemic when, unlike passenger transport which suffered a sharp slowdown, the freight sector was a fundamental factor in the system's resilience national economy and production. - he has declared Armando Brunini, Chief Executive Officer of Sea – Malpensa, has been the main Italian airport for years in the cargo sector and will be able to play a strategic role also at a European level thanks to the growing demand for e-commerce and the dynamism of the Italian entrepreneurial fabric. SEA will do its part to make this development sustainable”.
Di Palma of Enac: "Accompanying a new growth"
“Cargo was the first sector to recover pre-pandemic 2019 levels – said the President of Enac Pierluigi DiPalma – thus confirming that it was the segment that was least affected by the entire air transport crisis, because goods have always continued to travel despite the restrictions in force. Even significant increases have even been recorded at individual airports which have become, precisely in the context of the pandemic, the most important airports: and we are thinking, of course, of Milan Malpensa. Now it is a question of accompanying new growth and further development, through an intermodal, integrated and compatible cargo transport network".
