First Singapore Airlines out of Toowoomba Wellcamp a boost for regional producers

World class Queensland beef and vegetables will be loaded tomorrow (Friday June 19th) onto the first ever flight to Singapore from Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport.

Premier and Minister for Trade Annastacia Palaszczuk said the flight was a tremendous opportunity for the region’s exporters in testing times.

“Exports remain vital to our economy with one in five Queensland jobs supported by exports. Protecting these jobs depends on continued access to supply chains and markets,” Ms Palaszczuk said.   

“These flights are critical in doing that by getting Queensland’s high quality agricultural produce on dining tables and into supermarkets and restaurants in key global markets.”

The Singapore Airlines flight from Wellcamp is under the Federal International Freight Assistance Mechanism (IFAM) which subsidises air freight to accelerate the return of Australia’s high value agriculture and fisheries exports to key international export markets.

This is the second IFAM flight from Toowoomba after a Cathy Pacific flight laden with Darling Down’s product flew to Hong Kong on June 14.

The Premier praised the collaboration between the many individuals and organisations that have worked to co-ordinate the flights.

“Local exporters have been helped by the Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport, Toowoomba and Surat Basin Enterprise, Austrade, Trade and Investment Queensland, our outstanding producers and of course the airlines,” Ms Palaszczuk said.

Trade and Investment Queensland and the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries and Austrade have also been working together on getting access to cargo space on the flights from other airports for Queensland producers.

A network of 9 airlines and 6 freight forwarders are involved in IFAM flights which will continue from Queensland and include the new routes of Toowoomba-Singapore and Brisbane-Los Angeles.

Other existing routes that have been extended are:

• Brisbane-Singapore return
• Brisbane-Cairns-Hong Kong return
• Brisbane-Auckland return
• Toowoomba-Hong Kong one way

A new Darwin to Brisbane flight has also been funded to link with international IFAM freight flights.

Trade and Investment Queensland is the Queensland Government’s global business agency.

ENDS

Media contact: Chris O'Brien 0419 774 004