Dnata Cargo has scooped the top honour at the recent Air Transport World (ATW) 2007 Advertising Awards.

The annual ATW Advertising Awards recognise excellence in communicating key company attributes to customers. Evaluations were carried out in Washington DC and winners were chosen from several industry categories from the preceding year.

The award was presented to Ismail Ali Albanna, Executive Vice President Dnata, at the ATW Awards Ceremony in Washington, D.C, attended by hundreds of international airline industry professionals.

Advertising agency, Leo Burnett, in cooperation with Corporate Communications, used an image of a giraffe to illustrate the company’s exceptional reach. An ATW judge said: “This ad stood out because the unusual 'non-industry image' drew the judges' attention to the copy, which does a great job of communicating just how much Dnata Cargo cares. Lastly, the play on words in the headline was not lost on the judges. The point of this ad was well made and taken.”

The ATW Awards programme, launched in 1974, has gained importance over the years in becoming one of the most valuable advertising honours a company or person in the airline industry can achieve.

The new FreightGate-5 terminal in Dubai Airport Freezone proved a popular draw on the Dnata Cargo Stand at Air Cargo Europe in Munich Germany in June. The event is one of the best-known intermodal cargo conferences and exhibitions in Europe. 

The Dnata Cargo stand attracted large number of trade visitors who showed keen interest in the newly-built fully-automated terminal. The stand also featured  the soon-to-be-launched Calogi e-commerce web portal along with other new products and solutions.

Representatives from Dnata Cargo’s senior management and business development were on hand to meet customers and trade partners.

A Dnata Cargo Quality team have been rewarded for their ingenuity in improving services to customers.

Dnata Cargo Quality Team 11 came up with solutions to improve the process of transmission and uploading of Flight Finalisation Messages (FFMs) and has saved the unit more than a quarter of a million dirhams in addition to facilitating more rapid service delivery to its customers.

DACS plus, the Dnata cargo handling system, is designed to capture and record FFMs automatically, but a percentage of the messages had to be entered manually, mainly due to the variable nature of data.

The Quality Team – a regional first initiative for the air cargo industry in the Middle East – suggested a number of solutions, including small process changes in the system that have increased the number captured automatically, improving accuracy and the speed of transfers of shipments.

Dnata Cargo broke its own record in May handling over 109,000 calls during the  month at its 24-hour Customer Care Centre. This represents an increase of 22% over the same month last year. 

Dnata’s Customer Care Centre was the region’s first dedicated call centre for the air cargo community, when it was introduced in 2001. Geared to handle all service-related queries, the centre serves as a one-stop cargo information hub to provide shippers with a wide range of essential information such as: cargo bookings; shipment arrivals; reservations and rates; the status of Import, Export and Transit airway bills; and warehouse build-up and break-down status of shipments.

Dnata Cargo Customer Care Centre’s specially trained staff can assist callers in Arabic or English. Supported by sophisticated call and tracking systems, the 15-strong team is able to respond efficiently to customer queries, even during peak periods, as well as monitor and evaluate customer service levels to ensure optimal performance.

Elsewhere in customer relations, Dnata is currently working on a new online solution, Calogi, which will allow customers to complete their entire cargo shipping transaction from customs clearance to invoicing from their offices. Customer relations is also extending its Key Account Management services to land side activities so agents and freight forwarders can benefit from regular contact with a dedicated team to discuss operational matters.

Dnata Cargo’s Customer Care Centre, can be reached at: 04 2111 111 (English) and 04 2111 222 (Arabic).

Completion of the first runway of Dubai World Central International Airport (JXB), scheduled to be the world's largest passenger and freighter airport and cargo hub, is on target for October 2007.

“Over 70 per cent of JXB's first four and a half kilometre CAT III runway  is complete, with the target month for completion set for October 2007,” said HH Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum, Chairman of Dubai Aviation Corporation, Dubai World Central, as well as Chairman & Chief Executive, Emirates Airline & Group.

This runway, the first of six, will enable Dubai World Central to commence operations in mid-2008.

“The progress, achieved in just over a year, is a reflection of Dubai government's commitment to the region's burgeoning aviation infrastructure development. With US$82 billion earmarked for this growth in Dubai, the emirate is leading the way across the Middle East, African and South Asian markets, and is part of a global aviation market which will be worth US$2.6 trillion by 2025,” continued Sheikh Ahmed.

Dubai’s logistics industry continues to flourish, supported by significant investment. The creation of various free zones such as the Media City, Internet City and Jebel Ali Free Zone have helped kick start the growth of different industries. In turn, these growth engines contribute to the burgeoning economy, which is a definitely boost to the logistics industry.

Another important element in that equation is Dubai World Central (DWC), which is scheduled to be the world's largest airport city. "Unlike airports that serve cities, this will be a city that will serve the world's largest airport taking shape in Jebel Ali, Dubai.

This development is being built around Dubai World Central International Airport (JXB), which will incorporate housing, commercial, logistics, aviation and leisure components. Dubai World Central, a massive 140 square kilometre city — almost twice the size of Hong Kong Island — will also house Dubai Logistics City (DLC).