Two Kenyan airlines announced on Tuesday the first air cargo codesharing agreement to be established in Africa. The two are the public-private partnership national flag carrier Kenya Airways (specifically, its cargo unit, KQ Cargo) and private sector dedicated air cargo operator Astral Aviation. The codeshare agreement is aimed at stimulating trade between the continent and the Middle East.

“KQ Cargo and Astral Aviation have had a long-standing commercial cooperation for the past 20 years, and this partnership is a continuation of our efforts to strengthen collaboration and partnerships amongst African airlines and to boost intercontinental trade while driving sustainable development of the African continent,” pointed out Kenya Airways Cargo director Dick Murianki.

“This codeshare agreement, a first among two major players in the cargo sphere in Africa, will lead to a more efficient schedule and increased capacity for African traders wishing to bring in goods from the Middle East,” affirmed Astral Aviation CEO Sanjeev Gadhia.

The two operators have cooperated in cargo commercial and interline operations for 20 years. During the Covid-19 pandemic, for example, Astral Aviation contracted repurposed Boeing 787 Dreamliners from Kenya Airways to carry Covid-related materials from Guangzhou in China to Nairobi in Kenya, where they were sent on to other destinations across Africa. This cooperation has not only benefitted both carriers, but it has helped create the largest air cargo network in Africa, centred on Nairobi’s freighter-aircraft-friendly Jomo Kenyatta International Airport.

Under their new agreement, KQ Cargo will put its codeshare flight numbers on Astral Aviation flights from Dubai (in the United Arab Emirates) to Nairobi, for the onward distribution of air cargo to elsewhere in Africa. This new arrangement will exploit the strengths of the two operators and of the air cargo hub at Jomo Kenyatta International. As a result, it is expected that it will stimulate trade and the concomitant movement of commodities between the Middle East and Africa