The International Air Transport Association (IATA) is taking steps to address the looming pilot and mechanic shortage facing airlines globally. IATA’s training and qualification initiative looked at manufacturers’ market outlook studies, which predict that 17,650 new passenger aircraft will be delivered by 2018, requiring more than 200,000 new pilots, or nearly 19,000 pilots a year.
Current global training programs can produce a maximum of 15,200 per year, leaving a shortfall of more than 3,000 pilots annually. While the study looks a decade into the future, airlines are already feeling the effects of the pilot shortage. According to Juergen Haacker, IATA’s director of operations, at least six airlines have begun delaying deliveries of new aircraft because they do not have enough pilots to crew them. “The issue is significantly different between the continents,” said Haacker. “The major problem is that [the economies of] what we consider the emerging markets–Asia, the Middle East, India–[are] growing faster than the average of the rest of the world, but traditionally they have little capacity for training.”
More In Training and Workforce
