flynas highlights employment opportunities at the second edition of the Aviation Friday Forum.

flynas, the leading Saudi carrier and low-cost airline in the Middle East, launched the second edition of the “Let’s Talk Aviation” forum, titled “Future Career in the Aviation Sector”, which was held on Wednesday at Al Yamamah University in Riyadh. The forum witnessed a wide participation of decision-makers in recruitment and aviation, in the presence of flynas CEO Bandar Al-Muhanna.

In its second edition, the forum focused on the reality of employment and its future in the aviation sector in the Kingdom, which is the most prominent and important sectors that are relied upon to generate job opportunities and absorb graduates from the young men and women of the country, in order to achieve the goals of Saudi Vision 2030.

The session was attended by the Undersecretary of the Ministry of Labor and Social Development, Eng. Fahad Al-Badah, the Director General of Training at flynas, Captain Abdulmohsen Al-Arifi, the Dean of Student Affairs at Al Yamamah University, Dr. Sultan Al-Otaibi, the Director of the Saudi Academy of Civil Aviation, Mr. Fahad Al-Harbi, and the Human Resources Advisor in the Aviation Sector, Mr. Khalid Al-Dosari.

The Undersecretary of the Ministry of Labor and Social Development, Fahad Al-Baddah, pointed out that the aviation sector is witnessing a remarkable growth in Emiratization rates, praising the pivotal role achieved by flynas in this field, especially at the level of leadership positions, technical and maintenance professions, air hospitality, and co-pilots.

He touched on the role of the Ministry of Labor in terms of dividing the needs of the labor market, including the air transport sector, including air services, airports and ground services. He pointed to the discussion with the concerned companies and discussions with them to enable their capabilities, announcing that the main challenge that the ministry is working to address is to absorb the number of pilots currently available in the Kingdom.

He said: It is known that training pilots, after passing the academic stage, is very expensive, and this is what the ministry is working to follow. He stressed the importance of the partnerships we are witnessing today between a number of entities in the Kingdom and prestigious international academic and technical institutions, to provide qualified national expertise and the best trainees.

In turn, the Director of the Saudi Academy of Civil Aviation, Mr. Fahd Al-Harbi, reviewed the Academy’s rich history in the field of training national cadres, which has about 25,000 graduates. He pointed out that the main objective of the academy is to provide air traffic controllers, a profession that has been fully localized, pointing out that the tasks of the academy are to support air transport services, not provide pilots. He explained that the next phase will witness the development and increase of the number of airports in the Kingdom, and this will raise the percentage of the need for the profession of air traffic controllers, which has also become available to women, pointing out that the Academy graduated 12 air traffic controllers during the current year, representing the first batch of air traffic controllers.

He stressed that the Academy’s standards are in line with international standards, and that the Academy’s graduates enjoy the same experiences as their international counterparts. He also stressed the importance of new students following up on technologies and technological development in the aviation sector, which will lead the employment sector in the field of aviation, pointing out that the developments witnessed by the Kingdom in the tourism and business sector will increase the demand for air transport services that rely on modern technologies.

On the experience of Saudi universities in supporting the outputs needed by the aviation sector, the Dean of Student Affairs at Al Yamamah University, Dr. Sultan Al-Otaibi, touched on the experience of Al Yamamah University, reviewing the university’s contribution to supporting the outputs needed by the air transport sector, pointing out that the university provides specializations of jobs supporting the aviation sector, and recently launched the specialization of industrial engineering, as well as the university established a rehabilitation and training center, as well as a career rehabilitation center, which is the first at the level of private universities, and has achieved great successes with a number of From the sides, including flynas, Sabic and others. He pointed out that the role of universities is not limited to granting certificates only, but also in the extent of the university’s ability to qualify students to join the labor market and engage in it. He reviewed the university’s experience with flynas, in terms of qualifying suitable students for the labor market in the air transport sector.

For his part, Counselor Khalid Al-Dosari considered that the aviation sector in the Kingdom is one of the most qualified sectors to contribute to reducing unemployment rates. He pointed out that the two largest companies in the aviation industry in the world, Boeing and Airbus, have a large number of aircraft orders in the Middle East, and the largest share of them is for the Kingdom, by up to 50% or 60%, and this requires the development of a recruitment and qualification plan to meet this demand in the Kingdom. He considered that pilot jobs represent 10% of the total volume of employment in the aviation sector, while support jobs account for the largest share. Therefore, the student should focus on more than one option when deciding to work in the aviation and air transport sector in general.

Captain Abdulmohsen Al Arifi, General Manager of Training at flynas, spoke about the Future Pilots program, one of flynas’ pioneering localization initiatives. He stressed that the program, which was launched in 2010 with the aim of employing 200 aviation students by 2020, was able to achieve its targets of graduating more than 200 and will be completed by the end of this year. Among the pilots was the youngest Airbus commercial aircraft pilot in the world, at 26 years old.

Al-Arifi explained that it is necessary to generalize the importance in the various fields provided by the aviation sector to students, without focusing on leadership areas, especially since we suffer from a significant shortage of support jobs. He pointed out that it is assumed that the necessary mechanism is put in place to provide adequate and appropriate training for students so that they can start their work according to the appropriate center for them. He said: “We hope to establish a specialized academy to train pilots away from commercial standards, and touched on flynas’ plan to Saudize a number of jobs in it, thanks to the efforts and keenness of the company’s management.”