ZIMBABWE’S aviation industry is increasingly turning its attention to air cargo as a potentially important lever for trade expansion, export competitiveness and wider economic growth, amid renewed discussion over how the country can build a more efficient and commercially viable freight ecosystem.
This was the focus of last week’s inaugural Aviation Ground Services (AGS) Cargo Stakeholders Forum.
It came as government officials, airlines, service providers and logistics stakeholders were determined to assess what will be required to move the market from latent potential to sustained execution.
Delivering the opening remarks, AGS chief executive officer, Verengai Ruswa, said the forum was aimed at bringing together cargo stakeholders to identify practical solutions for sector growth.
“Collaboration is essential to strengthening Zimbabwe’s connectivity and competitiveness,” Ruswa told the meeting.
He added that strong stakeholder participation had reinforced the case for coordinated action.
“This is the beginning of a collective journey to reposition Zimbabwe in regional and global air cargo.”
The agenda itself pointed to both the scale of the opportunity and the structural constraints that continue to weigh on Zimbabwe’s air freight proposition.
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Alex Stancu, head of region for South and East Africa at the International Air Transport Association, spoke on global and regional cargo trends and the lessons Zimbabwe can draw from more successful markets. The significance of that intervention lay not only in benchmarking local performance against international practice, but also in framing air cargo as a strategic trade enabler rather than a narrow aviation sub-sector.
The policy dimension was reinforced in the keynote address by permanent secretary Joy Pedzisai Makumbe of the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructural Development, who outlined government’s aviation and air cargo ambitions under the National Development Strategy 2 and Vision 2030.
The broad policy thrust appears to be that aviation infrastructure, logistics reform and trade facilitation must increasingly work in tandem if Zimbabwe is to improve cargo throughput and attract sustainable airline interest.
That broader market reality was reflected in three panel discussions focusing on operational bottlenecks, the commercialisation of airfreight services and the need to rebuild cargo volumes through sustainable trade linkages and freighter connectivity.
Collectively, the sessions suggested that Zimbabwe’s air cargo constraints are not confined to capacity alone; they also involve coordination failures across the value chain. As such, any meaningful turnaround will likely depend on a more deliberate alignment between government, airport operators, airlines, ground handlers, freight forwarders, clearing agents and exporters.
The economic case is difficult to ignore. Export-oriented sectors such as horticulture and other time-sensitive industries depend on reliable uplift, efficient handling and predictable transit times to remain competitive in regional and offshore markets. Yet Zimbabwe has, over time, had to contend with constrained capacity, network shifts and rising logistics costs, all of which have weakened its position in a segment where consistency matters as much as price.
Last year, Dutch operator KLM cargo suspended flights from Harare to Amsterdam, exerting additional pressure on the industry.
There is hope from other players who are seeing Zimbabwe as an opportunity. Sanjiv Gadhia, the founder and CEO of Africa’s biggest cargo airline, Astral Aviation, confirmed his airline’s ad hoc flights to Harare, uplifting flowers, tobacco and blueberries.
He said Zimbabwe remained an important market, but needed to develop a stronger year-round cargo product.
“Zimbabwe is an important market for us, but the country needs a stronger cargo product.”
Against that backdrop, the forum’s action-oriented workshop, styled as “The Air Cargo Growth Manifesto”, appeared designed to move the conversation beyond diagnosis.
Its value will ultimately depend on whether stakeholders can convert shared concerns into measurable interventions, including better scheduling coordination, stronger cold-chain systems, more efficient clearance processes, improved cargo handling standards and targeted policy adjustments.
By the close of the forum, the underlying message was clear: Zimbabwe’s air cargo ambitions will be judged less by the strength of its declarations than by its capacity to execute across institutions.
If public and private sector actors can sustain coordination and address long-standing inefficiencies, the country may yet reposition air freight as a practical instrument for export growth and trade resilience.
Ndawana is an aviation industry marketing communications executive
