The Malaysian local think tank IDEAS stated that opening up skies within some areas will enable efficiency in e-commerce delivery and facilitate business operations. Open Skies is a new concept that involves freedom for movement of people and cargos within and across the countries. The major aviation policy of the region, the Asean Single Aviation Market (ASAM), was initiated by the Asean Air Transport Working Group (ATWG). Though ASAM has a support from member states, the implementation remains slow.
"Pushing the Asean integration is important, because the air transport segment is so important when we talk of e-commerce. There are a lot of new things going on, so eventually it is one thing we must look at as it completes the logistics chain for e-commerce," said IDEAS chairman Tan Sri Rebecca Fatima Sta Maria on the sidelines of a roundtable discussion conducted at the Asean level.
Sta Maria also explained that the Asean Open Skies agreement facilitates many aspects of the business along with tourism industry. Business travelling will become seamless. The seamless movement of business people is essential as they contribute to economy in a specific sense.
As per the statistics from the Department of Statistics Malaysia, the e-commerce’s share in the national gross domestic product (GDP) has increased from 5.9% in 2015 to 6.1% in 2016. International Trade and Industry Minister Datuk Seri Mustapa Mohamed outlined that Malaysia's e-commerce market would experience growth of 11% by 2020.
Sta Maria stated that member states have been striving to reach a common ground and they need assistance of some countries. "We need to get the other countries to accelerate, even if we have big initiatives. We have to support and put some resources into capacity building for the less-developed Asean states, so we can [all] grow faster," said Sta Maria.
IDEAS economic and business unit's coordinator Adli Amirullah expressed that ownership have remained major restraining factor in progress of ASAM. Seven out of 10 Asean member states adopted a "substantial ownership and effective control" model. It implies that nations must own nearly half of the airline’s shares and the control of airlines must reside within its nation.
Once this model is implemented efficiently, it will help the e-commerce logistics industry in achieving growth. In its recent report on the global e-commerce logistics market, Big Market Research offers insights on detailed segmentation, key market players, and opportunities lying ahead. As per the report, the global e-commerce logistics market is expected to register a CAGR of 10.10% from 2017 to 2021. The research also helps market players, investors, and stakeholders in gaining insights on strategies to be adopted to gain stronghold in the industry.