The Chinese market is so important for aviation that Boeing and Airbus decided to start building their airplanes there.

Actually they are not building the entire airplane, but only final assembly and delivery is done in China. I am very interested in this argument because we all know how much Chinese aviation is expanding rapidly and we definitely cannot ignore this.

We cannot ignore it for many reasons. In my opinion, specially for European future pilots, there are two main reasons we have to consider:

  • There’s a need for more pilots
  • We need to increase flight safety

Need for more pilots

As mentioned in a previous post, for the next 20 years we will need hundreds of thousands of pilots all over the world, specially in Asia.

This is an important fact for European future pilots because in the next few years European pilots will need to go abroad to find jobs, specially who has little flying hours.

If European airlines don’t hire new pilots at the same rate as Asian airlines, it is clear that to start their career they will have to move for a few years in China or in Asia.

Increase flight safety

If air traffic increases we also need to increase flight safety. We already witnessed incidents in Asia caused by poor training of both pilots and air traffic controllers.

We need to increase flight safety by preventing incidents through more and better training.

When we talk about training in aviation we always think of pilot training and maintenance training, but actually what I suggest is that everybody in aviation should be trained (from baggage handlers to managers).

You can read this report from IATA that I published in which it reported how safety is one of the jobs mostly required for the future of aviation. 

Concluding, the fact that Boeing and Airbus are building airplanes in China is a positive thing. There are new jobs being created, but clearly all of this mustn’t come at a price (more accidents).