Air India’s huge aircraft order to boost employment globally

A gateway of opportunity has opened in the aviation sector as Air India’s deal with Airbus and Boeing presents a welcoming phase for job aspirants.

The deal is worth $80-100bn as the order for 470 passenger planes would present numerous opportunities of employment of skilled pilots, cabin crew and engineers

According to agency reports, Air India will need more than 6,500 pilots to operate the 470 aircraft it is getting. Word from Joe Biden, the United States President, applauds that “over a million American jobs across 44 states will be provided.”

Srikanth, head of the Department of Aeronautical Engineering, at Nitter Meenakshi Institute of Technology, Bangalore, through CNBCTV18 pointed out the staggering opportunities stemming from this ground breaking deal.

Giving a calculated idea on its meaning for the aviation sector, he confirmed that direct and indirect jobs carved for a narrow-body aircraft alone is 400, and for a wide-body plane, the same is 600-700.

He further stated that “If this is added to the new jobs that will be created in the aligned sectors like manufacturing, over 2,00,000 direct and indirect jobs likely to be created in India”

Read also: NAHCO profit margin hits 7-yr high despite hurdles

So, vacancies for front runner positions as pilots, cabin crew and technical & non-technical staff would be opened for application. he explained. Indirect staff supporting the aircraft, airport staff, air traffic controllers, transport vendors, service providers and others will also be required.

Also, Ajoy Thomas, vice president and business head at TeamLease Services, told CNBCTV18 to expect a rise in customer service, cabin crew and ground operations jobs.

Stating “this and the next quarter, the aviation sector is expected to hire 20 percent more people as a result of additional aircraft purchases.”

Citing that job openings for mechanics and technicians, for aircraft and avionics equipment, air traffic controllers and engineers will also be available.

Experts say that MSMEs in India will experience a boom in outcome, further generating local employment opportunities. In the vein of skill, MRO maintenance repairs and overhaul will be one of the top skills in demand as the production of the Airbus fleet will require skilled engineers to maintain the aircraft.

More insight from Skrikanth, elaborates that “There will be a rise in demand for manufacturing skills, as well as structural analysis and competition analysis software skills to analyse the strength of the materials. Additionally, artificial intelligence and machine learning skills are expected to be in high demand”

The Ministry of Civil Aviation, in 2022 said in the Lok Sabha (the lower house of India’s bicameral parliament) that the Indian aviation industry will likely give employment to 1,00,000 people by 2024.

The directorate general of Civil Aviation, reported that after the Covid-19 crisis in 2020 and 2021, aviation passenger traffic in India grew by 47 percent to 123.2 million passengers in 2022