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It is time to rebuild passenger confidence in checked baggage

Staff Reporter
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Recently, I was on a flight that was severely delayed with most passengers trying to bring their luggage into the cabin. There was simply no space on board. The flight ended up leaving more than an hour late.
No doubt fears of their bags being misplaced or long delays waiting at the baggage carousel were weighing heavily on most passengers’ minds. They no longer felt confident checking their baggage.
What are the numbers telling us?
Data from the latest SITA Baggage IT Insights report confirms a spike in baggage mishandling emerging from the pandemic. Over the past year, we’ve seen a swifter-than-expected recovery of passenger demand, particularly for international travel. The latest data from IATA shows global traffic for April 2023 to have reached 90.5% of April 2019 levels, with traffic surges at holiday periods matching and even surpassing pre-pandemic levels.
This has coincided with airlines, airports, and ground handlers still suffering staff and resource shortages, along with a lack of baggage experience and expertise in new staff. The 2023 Baggage IT Insights report shows the global rate of mishandled bags per thousand passengers jumped 74.7% from 2021 to 2022, reaching 7.6.
One of the biggest pain points contributing to this is transfers, where bags are connected from one flight to another. The proportion of mishandled bags delayed at transfer increased to 42%, owing to the resurgence of international and long-haul travel. The likelihood of mishandling a bag on international routes is about eight times higher compared to domestic routes due to the challenges at transfer.
Rebuilding passenger confidence: digitalisation is the key
The industry recognizes that restoring passengers’ confidence to check their baggage is a top priority. Digitalisation has proven a tried-and-true lever to achieve this while boosting operational efficiency and customer satisfaction. Wide implementation of technologies for the automated tracking and repatriation of baggage contributed to a 70% drop in the mishandling rate from 2007 to 2019.
Airlines and airports have already been investing in IT solutions that deliver greater automation and self-service to tackle the current challenges. According to SITA’s 2022 Air Transport IT Insights, by 2025, 84% of airlines plan to provide real-time baggage status information to their staff and 67% plan to offer this to passengers. In addition, touchless bag tagging options that rely on kiosks and passengers’ mobile devices are a priority for 98% of airlines and 95% of airports.
We know that passengers embrace this too: SITA’s 2022 Passenger IT Insights report found that greater technology adoption giving passengers more autonomy and control in baggage processes correlates with more positive emotions from passengers. From 2016 to 2022, technology adoption at the bag collection stage rose from zero to 29% of passengers receiving mobile notifications for bag collection. In the same period, passengers reported a 9% increase in positive emotions at bag collection.
Identifying and addressing key pain points in the baggage journey
The post-pandemic recovery has thrown into stark relief the key challenges airports are facing along the baggage journey, and the major advantages of having greater visibility and digitalization across the whole value chain. At SITA, we continue to work directly with airlines and airports to help resolve key pain points in the journey through smart automation, tracking, and digital platforms, with the aim of restoring passengers’ confidence to check in their bags.
For example, in partnership with Lufthansa, we have developed the WorldTracer Auto Reflight system in direct response to the high mishandling rates observed at transfer. This collaborative innovation uses digital automation to suggest suitable routing for rush bags and informs the baggage system of new bag routing using the original bag tag. It proactively informs the passenger upon arrival of any delay, allowing them to save time by bypassing baggage collection and tracking their bag’s new journey and delivery via mobile.
The results of the recent Proof of Concept suggest that we can automatically reflight as much as 70% of Lufthansa’s mishandled bags at Munich Airport. With repatriation of mishandled bags costing an estimated $150 per bag, we estimate that automation of reflight operations could save the industry up to $30 million per year.
Elsewhere we’re working to provide end-to-end visibility of the whole baggage journey, eventually ensuring passengers can track their bags in the same way they would track the delivery of a parcel. We have worked closely with our industry partners to develop solutions like SITA Bag Manager, which scans and evaluates every bag that is loaded onto a plane, a ULD, or a cart, and SITA Bag Journey, which transforms baggage processing information from each step of the journey into a chronological, user-friendly view of what has happened to the bag.
With smart technology like this on their side, airlines and airports are equipped to provide both staff and passengers a precise, real-time view of where bags are at each step of the journey, via mobile for maximum convenience, allowing them to breathe easy with their bags checked.

Nicole Hogg is Director of Baggage, SITA

CANEX AND AFRIFF LAUNCH ‘SCRIPT TO SCREEN’ FOR AFRICAN FILMMAKERS

Staff Reporter
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The African Export Import Bank (Afreximbank), through its Creative Africa Nexus (CANEX) programme, in partnership with The African International Film Festival (AFRIFF) – one of Africa’s largest and most vibrant film festivals, is excited to announce its ‘Script to Screen’ intervention. This project is a year-long incubator, capacity development and content creation acceleration programme, focused on African filmmakers/producers and writers who are interested in improving their ability to create and deliver quality screen content.
In the course of the programme, participants will be immersed in a ‘Writers Lab’ anchored by accomplished writers who have attained global recognition in the film industry. The programme will include development residencies, workshops on financial management, business skills, entertainment law and IP and distribution strategies. Participants will also get an opportunity to pitch their projects to international studios and streamers during the programme.
This film industry development initiative reflects one of CANEX’s core pillars aimed at building upstream capacity within the audiovisual value chain, with a view to enhancing the exportability of African film content. The Cultural and Creative Industries (CCIs) have become a powerful transformative force in the world today, being among the most rapidly growing sectors in the global economy, in terms of income generation, job creation and export earnings. In this regard, Afreximbank acknowledges the prominent role that some CCI sectors, including the film industry, can play in economic transformation and youth engagement on the continent.
Against this backdrop, the Script to Screen Film Accelerator Programme aims to achieve these specific objectives:
Train 30 youth in the development of exportable film content
Facilitate the development of indigenous intellectual property
Provide a platform for the associated intellectual property (IP) to be showcased to streamers
(e.g Amazon, Netflix etc)
Enhance the competitiveness of African filmmakers by providing exposure to cutting edge technology and other tools that will enable them grow production quality
Foster the development of Africa’s film development through networking and partnerships
Provide up and coming African filmmakers with increased visibility and recognition
Provide participants with mentoring and related support services.
AFRIFF Founder and Festival Director, Chioma Ude, in expressing her gratitude to partners stated, “Over the years, CANEX has been a critical development partner and collaborator of AFRIFF and continues to be a major pilar of support. The possibilities that this collaboration enables, continue to build the much-needed structure and capacity in the African creative industry, as well as amplify the collective values shared by AFRIFF and CANEX in promoting greater creative business opportunities on the continent.”
Afreximbank through CANEX, recognizes positive developments and notable strides achieved by AFRIFF in its contributions to the growth of the film industry in Africa, as a launch pad for creative talents to connect to opportunities and realize the endless possibilities as their contemporaries around the world.

Populist Politics and Globalization

Alazar Kebede
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The integrated world economy has been shaken by repeated crises. The dramas have led to more and more unease about “globalization”, or alternately, as its critics call the process, “neoliberalism,” “turbo-capitalism,” “casino capitalism,” “disordered capitalism,” “capitalism pure” or “Anglo-Saxon economics.”
With every crisis, an initial reaction is that the new events spell the end of a particular model of liberal economics, the so-called Washington consensus. In fact, although some crises can be cathartic and push policymakers to take corrective measures, others can be Carthaginian. In the history of the past two centuries, there has only been one such radically destructive crisis, the Great Depression, and it is not surprising that people are terrified of repeating the experience.
Holger Schmieding, Chief economist at Berenberg Bank in London explained that what are the consequences of the periodic collapses of the global economy? Is the newest and most serious episode a step on the road to a profound backlash against globalization and integration? In 1990s, the United States government and international financial institutions held up the American system as a model for emulation.
One decade later, the roles seem to be reversed, and it is Asia that now has the right to lecture the Americans, while Europeans are confidently predicting the imminent export of a European social model to the United States. There is a new level of radical uncertainty about institutional design. According to Holger Schmieding, the slogan of the new age, which was much ridiculed at the time, became that associated with Margaret Thatcher: There Is No Alternative (TINA). In most countries, old political divisions between right and left no longer made sense in the light of globalization.
Holger Schmieding argued that at the heart of the left-right divide had been a struggle for redistribution, with the left wanting to redistribute more, and the right wanting less redistribution. In democracies, this often produced a convergence around the center, in that both left and right-wing parties needed to appeal to a median voter. This seemed to rule out either extreme of expropriation or the absence of redistributive taxation.
In the last decades of the 20th century, however, the factors of production became more mobile. Small countries such as Sweden with deep social democratic traditions had to lower their rates of corporate taxation in order to prevent an exodus of firms. Instead of a left-right divide, a new center emerged that welcomed globalization.
In Latin America, leftists with a Marxist background saw international openness as a way of modernizing society. So did the Communist party in some parts of India and so, above all, did the Chinese Communist party. There was thus more convergence and consensus about the idea of the market economy than at any previous time in the 20th century.
Harold James, Harvard University Fellow, stated that instead of concentrating on the battle for redistribution, which had been the political theme of the world after the Great Depression as well as after the Second World War, societies in the East and West looked for new political issues, in part because when capital flows undermined the capacity and the efficacy of national redistributionist politics, old-style politicians looked helpless.
Harold James further noted that politicians instead focused on the environment, on corruption, in short, on issues not simply or directly related to an agenda of redistribution. They felt their voters had become convinced of the hopelessness of conventional politics, which seemed to offer no real choice. For better or worse, the world is living in exciting times. On the one hand, globalization and rapid technological change are creating huge opportunities.
On the other hand, the gains are not evenly distributed. There are two major winners: the hundreds of million people in formerly closed economies who have been lifted out of extreme poverty over the last two decades on an unprecedented scale; the much smaller, but very influential group of those in the advanced world who are drivers of innovation, have the required skill sets or at least the flexibility to adjust to the new global division of labor.
Conversely, those who see themselves as losers of change are concentrated in the advanced world among those who lack either the opportunity, the skills or flexibility to adjust. Their plight is often made worse by regulations and by education and welfare systems that hinder, rather than promote, the required flexibility. As usual in history, rapid change and significant immigration generate a political backlash among those who see themselves as the losers of change.
Harold James noted that across much of the Western world, this backlash has been exacerbated by the legacy of the post-Lehman mega-recession. The crisis itself was caused by a twin policy mistake, inflating a big credit bubble until 2007 and then letting it burst in a way that triggered the worst recession in most developed countries in almost 80 years.
Sadly, as the World Bank report revealed, the surge in public debt in the wake of this mega-recession by 41% of GDP in the United States and 26% in the eurozone from 2015 to 2020 has left hardly any room for governments to compensate the actual or perceived losers of globalization. The financial crisis and the extraordinary measures needed to contain it have also fed a pervasive “anti-establishment” sentiment.
As a result, disenchanted voters have been drawn to populists from the ultra-right and ultra-left of the political spectrum on both sides of the Atlantic. Short on arguments but long on rhetoric, the populists have skillfully harnessed stratified social media in which mainstream views are often drowned out in favor of circles whose members reinforce each other’s views. The radicals from the left and the right have their differences.
But as they rebel against the real or perceived indignities of globalization, they largely agree on one point. According to Harold James, they both reject the open societies and the free economic exchanges that underpin the prosperity of advanced countries and offer the emerging economies the only feasible path to catch up with the free societies of the Western world.

The Harambee Factor

Staff Reporter
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There is hardly any literature that deals specifically with the India-Africa development partnership. Over the years, multiple changes in political leadership have taken place in both India and Africa, particularly in Africa, where the change of government is often by force. However, the partnership remained constant. Bringing African participation to a more significant number of international fora and participating in the new emerging order was a steady Indian policy.

Today, India and Africa have developed a vibrant partnership animated by the spirit of developing together as equals, focussing on capacity building, development cooperation and economic and technological initiatives.

This spirit of cooperation is the connecting thread of the book entitled The Harambee Factor: India – Africa Economic and Development Partnership. The word Harambee is a Swahili word for cooperation. This book consisting of 12 chapters traces and analyses the evolution of Indian development cooperation with Africa.

The author of the book is Gurjit Singh. Gurjit Singh was former Ambassador of India to Germany, Indonesia, Ethiopia, ASEAN and the African Union. He Chaired the CII Business Task Force on Trilateral Cooperation in Africa including the Asia Africa Growth Corridor with Japan. He comments on current events on TV and in journals. His report on such cooperation in 2019, focused on private sector engagement to make Trilaterals successful.

He is associated with the social impact investment movement and is working on expanding it in Africa along with other trilateral initiatives, including with Japan, for B2B engagement. He is an independent director of companies achieving social impact. He is also associated with civil society efforts through the Aavishkar Foundation, and the Advisory Council of Nobel Peace Laureate, Kailash Satyarthi. Capital caught up with him to talk about his new book. Excerpts;

 

Capital: What motivated you to write “The Harambee Factor: India – Africa Economic and Development Partnership”?

Gurjit Singh: Whenever you search for India-Africa Economic and Development Partnership you end up getting a lot of results about Africa and other partners. India seems to be getting mentioned only as an adjunct or in passing. My motivation to write this book was to place on record the details of what India’s engagement with Africa has been, particularly in the 21st century when an emerging India has engaged with an emerging Africa on new terms beneficial to both.

Thus, it was an effort to use my experience in and about Africa and share it with decision makers, academies and students so that a better understanding of how India and Africa engage can be achieved.

Capital: Could you provide an overview of the key themes and main arguments presented in your book?

Gurjit Singh: My book attempts to provide a background to the context in which India and Africa engaged in the 21st century after the Cold War. Both had their own challenges and met them differently.

My book aims to provide an understanding of the Indian approach to Africa. How it differs from others, its successes and failures. It particularly focuses on the human resource development, capacity building, and efforts to build African institutions through a three-tier engagement with Africa. The bilateral tier, the regional tier through the RECs and the Pan African tier through the African Union.

Capital: How would you describe the historical relationship between India and Africa in terms of economic and development cooperation?

Gurjit Singh: Historically, the Indian engagement with Africa for Economic Cooperation has been private sector led. This was from pre-colonial times, as well. Secondly, the India Africa relationship benefited from capacity builders and educationists. Architects and masons often came from India and military generals and trainers went from Africa in the Middle Ages. In the last century, Indian teachers came in a big way to Ethiopia and eastern Africa, leaving an indelible mark. The Development Partnership, which emerged through growing Indian communities and diaspora in Africa brought the element of philanthropy to match the development aspirations of the countries they lived in, building schools, colleges, hospitals, clinics, and the like. It is these ideas that I have tried to build upon.

Capital: What are some of the major challenges and opportunities you discuss in the book regarding the India-Africa partnership?

Gurjit Singh: A major challenge before India and Africa, which is often an opportunity too, is that South-South cooperation needs to succeed with a willingness on both sides. The pandemic and the Ukraine crisis broke out, South South cooperation was gently moving towards adjusting to north south cooperation as well in a benign way. However, the shortages of financing backed by unfulfilled promises from the larger partners of Africa have always been a challenge. India took the opportunity and supported Africa for the last two decades, particularly the HIPC countries, Ethiopia was a major beneficiary of Indian lines of credit. These lines of credit, then, catalysed Indian investment which also came to Ethiopia for instance, in a big way.

However, consequent debt stress, shortage of foreign exchange, economic and political instability do cause a concern to overseas investors. These become challenges. In my book, I have two surveys, one of African interlocutors talking about India and one about Indian entrepreneur looking at Africa. Those surveys highlight the challenges and opportunities quite well.

Capital: Can you highlight any specific case studies or success stories that demonstrate the positive impact of India-Africa economic and development collaboration?

Gurjit Singh: Among the success stories are the fact that Indian lines of credit which went to support LDCs and HIPC countries in Africa catalysed much investment. The three largest recipients of LOC in Africa from India, were Tanzania, Mozambique and Ethiopia. In my book, I’ve shown that how these then became catalysts for larger Indian investment and much larger Indian trade.

Besides this, Indian investment has been mainly in the SME sector, and has helped to build African capacities, transfer technology and generate local employment.

Capital: In your opinion, what are the key factors that have contributed to the growth of India-Africa trade and investment in recent years?

Gurjit Singh: I believe these are important factors that have contributed to the growth of trade and investment between India and Africa. Indian trade now is about $90 billion and Indian investment about $75 billion both of which are substantial on their own

Capital: What role do you see India playing in Africa’s infrastructure development and capacity building efforts?

Gurjit Singh: India has always taken the view that it would abide by Africa’s priorities. This is what Prime Minister Modi said in the Ugandan Parliament when he laid out India’s Africa policy in 2018. Similarly, through the 3 India Africa summits so far, the support to infrastructure development and capacity building effort is immense. India, in fact, supports a capacity building approach to Africa, and the number of scholarships, the support to institution building in Africa and the success of the Pan African E-network project over 47 countries was an important role that India has played. You may recall for the PA ENP, Ethiopia was the pilot project and worked very well through the Addis Ababa University and the Black Lion hospital for tele education and telemedicine.

Capital: How has India’s engagement with Africa evolved over time, and what are the implications for the future of the partnership?

Gurjit Singh: India’s engagement with Africa over the last two decades, saw it become from a purely development cooperation partner to an economic partner, because about $12 billion has been invested by India through concessional loans to 41 African countries; this was quite unprecedented, and these followed the international norms for lending. Based on this, Indian private sector was encouraged to reach many more countries and intensify their role in countries where India was already present. The I T E C program is the leading brand for capacity building efforts in India and in the survey in my book it came out as the most recognized Indian brand in Africa. India also has 25,000 African students most of them paying their own way. Therefore, the capacity building, human resource development and investment led approach is part of the evolution of India’s engagement with Africa in recent years and this I believe, will continue to serve Africa well. Africa needs more investment and more training for its growing number of youths.

Capital: What are some of the policy recommendations or suggestions you offer in the book to enhance and strengthen the India-Africa economic and development partnership?

Gurjit Singh: In order to strengthen India Africa partnership in the current phase, my book recommends several things. Mainly it suggests supporting the private sector for investment and not pushing lines of credit further because of the debt stress situation and repayment problems. I have suggested that we should have funds to support the development of DPR to have bankable projects pipeline in Africa which could then be picked up by international financing consortiums. Indian investors should be encouraged and supported to overcome the difficulties that they have mentioned in the survey in the book. With the AfCFTA in place, larger regional markets are now available, which Indian investors welcome. If they are given a good investment ambience, they will certainly come. The destination that Indian investors choose will determine how close India comes to a particular country

I also recommended more technology partnerships and civil society engagement particularly to build impact investment for implementing the SDGs.

Capital: How do you envision the future of the India-Africa relationship? Are there any emerging trends or areas of potential collaboration that you find particularly promising?

Gurjit Singh: One of the segments of my book, looking at the future talks about impact investing. For over a decade, the Sankalp Africa summit held in Nairobi has promoted SDG implementation through private investments. For the first time, this Sankalp West Africa summit was held in Ghana in June 2023. This is a unique concept which has worked well in India. Many traditional donors contributed to this. These were neither grants nor loans but pure investment in early-stage projects, which must attain some of the SDGs like health, education, renewable energy, women’s empowerment waste and water disposal and the like. This concept is something that we must bring to Ethiopia and across Africa in a bigger way.

Capital: What has been the response to your book so far, both from Indian and African audiences?

Gurjit Singh: The Harambee Factor has been very well received in India and in several parts of Africa. It came out just after the pandemic. Most of the discussions were held virtually, which was also an advantage. The book was launched on Africa Day by the Indian Council of World Affairs, which also promoted the book. I have addressed audiences discussing the book in universities, in international centres, and in many online and virtual mediums. This has also been done in several African countries. But yes, certainly since this book is meant to increase an understanding of India in Africa. I welcome more African attention to it, through the media, television, and newspapers.

I’ve had discussions on the book in Kenya, both on television and in book clubs, in Senegal in a university, in Ethiopia, through the India Business Forum.

Capital: Are there any specific lessons or insights you hope readers will take away from “The Harambee Factor”?

Gurjit Singh: The main emphasis of my book is that while many countries may profess to do more and in comparison, it may look that India does less but in reality, perhaps India does better in Africa. This is because the people-to-people engagement, the private sector led approach focusing on human resource development and fulfilling the development priorities of our African partners are important assets, which cannot be accused of only pushing a one-sided agenda. Similarly, India tried to build the capacities of the African Union and the regional economic communities by supporting them. All these have taken time and effort and not succeeded equally. These are indeed efforts worth making.

Capital: How can individuals, governments, and organizations contribute to fostering and supporting the India-Africa economic and development partnership?

Gurjit Singh: More and more foreign policy is being linked to people-to-people initiatives. Indian interaction with Africa was actually led by People-to-People interaction by traders, educationists, investors and technology partners. Therefore, the support of the individuals, particularly who invest in Africa, or who have studied in India and come back or who teach in Africa is very important to build the character of African youth so that they become assets to their societies. Indian social and civil society organizations have had successful forays into Africa and need to be supported to do more. Government should look at supporting the private sector, civil society sector and dedicated people to expand the sharing of experience between India and Africa for mutual benefit. We should make the SDGs our goal and then pursue them through such fostering of the partnership

Capital: Are there any upcoming initiatives or projects that you are aware of, which further contribute to strengthening India-Africa ties?

Gurjit Singh: India Africa ties are moving from a debt led period to an investment led period. I think you will see a rise in India’s investments in African countries with greater gusto because the Indian private sector has the will to seek new markets and engage them with greater strength than two decades ago. In the next five years, I believe that Indian investment in Africa will double. Along with this investment will come capacity building institutions which will be backwardly integrated into the new investments so, training will be provided in areas where it is required so that those trained can be employed.

I see technology and startups as a big development in the near future. I also see the health sector as an area where Indian companies and doctors can play a big role in furthering Africa’s ambitions in their health sector.

Capital: What are your personal hopes and aspirations for the future of India-Africa relations, and how do you see your book contributing to that vision?

Gurjit Singh: My vision for the development of India Africa relations is that India should continue to support Africa for getting its voice heard better in international fora. To this end, the initiative by India under its G 20 presidency to have the AU admitted as a member of the G 20 is a laudable step.

I also believe that India should support the implementation of the agenda 2063 and countries which have projects under that should discuss it with India. India should respond towards government plus private sector plus academia exercise under the India Development Initiative. This idea is developed in the book.

I am particularly keen that India and Africa focus on the youth of their countries because with very young populations, we can create a huge and dynamic economic force provided we educate keep healthy and build capacities for our youth. The future certainly belongs to India and Africa. I believe that the Indian model is better accepted, better implemented and conscious of the realities of African aspiration. That is why many g7 countries are working with India on trilateral cooperation in Africa, which will develop more in the future.

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