Lufthansa Cargo, Europe's biggest airfreight carrier, boosted volume in April by 5.4 percent from a year ago as traffic on its Americas routes soared by nearly a third.

Lufthansa Cargo carried 154,000 metric tons of freight in April, taking traffic for the first four months of the year to 583,000 tons, a gain of 1.6 percent on the same period in 2007.

Cargo revenues in April rose 3.2 percent on-year, outpacing a 3-percent increase in capacity. The load factor, or portion of cargo space filled, was stable at 68.4 percent.

The Americas network continued to drive Lufthansa's growth, with traffic surging by 31.3 percent in April to 51,000 tons, more than double the 15.3 percent rise in Asia-Pacific freight to 47,000 tons.

Lufthansa continued to shift capacity from Asia to the Americas, mainly on U.S. routes, but revenues and load factors aren't keeping pace. The carrier boosted capacity in April by nearly 52 percent from a year ago, but revenues grew only 30.4 percent and the load factor declined by 5.7 percentage points to 65.3 percent.

Journal of Commerce