Carlos Guillermo Aragón Farkas

What makes FAM TEAM well-positioned to cater to the maritime and air freight needs of Colombian companies?

FAM TEAM meets most of the needs in the logistics chain for maritime shipping and air cargo. We are general sales agents for Singapore Airlines Cargo in South America, and we serve our clients both in air and maritime freight services through our worldwide agency network. We also are maritime agents for the French company CMA-CGM, the third-largest shipping line in the world. Our team has a front office that takes care of the commercial, political dimension, and institutional coordination and a consolidated back office for administration. The takeaway is that our key strategic international partnerships have a unified administration. Our focus regarding business development rests primarily on the private sector, helping in the logistics of various industries including: agribusiness, consumer goods, construction, and commodities. We do not cater to large companies with major tonnages, but rather, have been focusing on SMEs, which yields us a greater number of customers. Colombia remains our primary market, for which we have a specialized approach to trading. This country is different from its Latin American counterparts. Most of the trading is done in metropolitan cities, whereas Colombia has Mediterranean cities at high altitudes and remotely located from ports. Around 80% of the Colombian economy takes place inland and in the mountains.

What trends in transport are interesting today, and how does the company stay at the forefront of those trends?

Ports are particularly important for Colombia, even though they are transitional points of our trade activities, with the bulk of trade concluding inland. Road access is difficult, which hampers transportation. Our group of companies coordinate, facilitate and work cargo from its point of origin through the inbound port logistics, air, sea, land transportation, and the empty container logistics through our depot network, finalizing with specialized customs clearance and warehousing services. We focus on mid-size shippers which allows us to plan better to meet our customers’ needs. The group has been serving vessel owners and shipping companies for over 100 years handling more than six vessels per day in all Colombian ports, operating over 100,000 transshipments from all over the world in Cartagena, coordinating and managing more than 100,000 containers for the Colombian domestic market.

Where would you like to see FAM TEAM in the mid- and long-term? What countries are interesting expansion propositions?

We are mostly concentrated in Colombia, with partnerships across the continent and cargo agents all over the globe. Our expansion plans include the positioning of our cargo agency in the region, along with the expansion and growth of our air services in the Andean countries as well as a growing presence as vessel and carrier agents in Latin America.

What role do logistics services play within economic reactivation, and why is FAM TEAM important within Colombia’s post pandemic reactivation?

We understand successful businesses are run by companies with a strong footing in technology. However, on its own technology is mute, as systems and applications need to be understood, our group knows its application and has specialized in inhouse developments in order to tailor solutions for customers in the logistics sector. The Colombian market adds to the challenge of building up our business, Major corporations require local partners in Colombia, and in turn we compliment their introduced contributions enabling them to accurately navigate the complexities of this business environment. To summarize we can represent, advice, support, and enable companies to succeed in logistics in Colombia and the region, for that purpose we offer a consolidated group of companies that covers various aspects of this industry from the multimodality of transportation to the container and cargo logistics.