Industry

Pilots, engineers shortage to slow airline industry

aviation

Air traffic controllers in Nairobi. A shortage of airline workers is set to slow down expansion plans. File

A shortage of pilots, flight engineers and air traffic controllers threatens to slow down the expansion plans and profitability of Kenyan airlines that will be forced to pay higher salaries to retain and attract talent.

The Kenya Civil Aviation Authority (KCAA) says the number of commercial planes is expected to jump to 120 from the current 40 in the next 20 years in what will more than triple demand for the staff.

But poaching of local staff by global carriers such as Emirates and slow supply of new pilots and flight engineers due to high training costs is set to leave the Kenyan industry with a staffing gap.

“In 10 years, we will have a problem and we need more people to fill this gap,” said KCAA air navigation services director Rueben Lubanga.

The shortage has seen pay for pilots nearly double over the past three years, putting pressure on margins with airlines spending more on training and re-training.

The entry level for a commercial pilot in Kenya is Sh320,000 up from Sh200,000 three years ago. Cabin crew salaries have also risen to between Sh100,000 and Sh150,000 with this expected to increase further as skills become scarcer.

Airlines have been forced to train cabin crews, a move that is proving to be an expensive affair. Kenya Airways (KQ), for example, spends Sh8.5 million to train one pilot. Training of a cabin crew takes between four to six months at a cost of Sh125,000— Sh200, 000 according to the East African School of Aviation.

KQ has invested Sh1.1 billion in a Boeing 737 flight simulator for pilots’ in-house training as opposed to sending trainees to South Africa and Ethiopia.

Airlines all over the world have been hit by staff shortages and the crisis is expected to worsen in the next 20 years.

The International Civil Aviation Organisation estimates that annually 52,506 pilots need to be trained, but there is capacity for 44,360 pilots, creating a gap of 8,146 pilots globally.

By 2030, this number is expected to increase to 169,920. The same gap is found in the maintenance crew which has a deficit of 18,071 employees and air traffic controllers 1,978 employees.

The high training fees has pushed most airlines to poach talent from rivals to satisfy the appetite for high staff numbers as they increase routes to grow revenue. Last year, a plan by KQ to recruit cabin crew from its competitors in East Africa sparked fears of a new round of salary increments as airlines raced to retain their best employees.

KQ made its intentions of poaching cabin crew from rival airlines clear through newspaper advertisements. Fly 540 operations manager Nixon Ooko said it was unfair for KQ to openly declare that it wanted to hire professionals from other airlines knowing only too well how expensive it is to train staff to get to the level of efficiency that every airline is looking for.

The move prompted rival airlines including Rwandair, Fly540, Air Uganda, JetLink and Precision Air to increase their staff salaries besides offering other perks such as health and flight allowances to retain employees.

“The market is highly competitive because the human resource is limited by the number of skilled staff,” said Mr Lubanga.

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