THE cargo shipment going in and out of Shenzhen Bao’an International Airport reached 507,000 tons between January and April, up by 36.3 percent year on year, data from the Shenzhen airport said Sunday.

In April, the airport handled 135,000 tons of cargo, up by 25.9 percent since last April, following the 373,000 tons of cargo shipped through the Pudong airport in Shanghai and the 173,000 tons at the Baiyun airport in Guangzhou.

Among the cargo, the throughput of international cargo at the Shenzhen airport reached 50,000 tons, up by 59.2 percent.

In the rankings of the world’s top 40 airports, the Shenzhen airport jumped from being in 20th place last year to 16th in the first quarter of this year.

The increase of the cargo throughput was partly attributed to the cold-chain products of high added value. Shenzhen airport handled 5,000 tons of imported cold-chain cargo between January and April, up by 190 percent over the same period last year.

Recently, the airport put into use the centralized conditioned warehouse, and that greatly improved its capability and efficiency in cold-chain product storage and transportation.

In another development, Hainan Airlines announced Sunday that flight operators under its flag can offer refunds or flight change services for free to ticket buyers for the flights coming and leaving Shenzhen and Guangzhou airports between May 31 and June 30.

(Han Ximin)