"CAE is not just about developing a state-of-the-art full-flight simulator; it also provides world-leading training for pilots, maintenance technicians, cabin crew and air traffic controllers"

According to CAE's biennial Aviation Talent Forecast, an estimated 1.5 million civil aviation professionals will be needed worldwide by 2034 - with the largest percentage required in the Asia Pacific region. The comprehensive 2025 edition of the forecast analyzes the need for pilots, aircraft maintenance technicians, cabin crew, and, for the first time, air traffic controllers, predicting that 71,000 controllers will be needed globally over the next 10 years.

- - Michel Azar-Hmouda, CAE Division President, Commercial Aviation

Michel Azar-Hmouda, CAE Division President, Commercial Aviation in an exclusive interview with Vishal Kashyap, Managing Editor, Aviation World shares the insight of CAES presence into India and the plans ahead on the map. Excerpts...

CAE published the requirement of talent forecast needed over next 10 years. So, would you elaborate in details, about this forecast and specific to the numbers for Asia, and India in particular?

I will share with you the mechanics around and how we look at this forecast in terms of a 10-year view. There are really two components to it; one is the aircraft deliveries coming to a specific region. Based on how many aircraft are coming to a region or country, we work out on the required numbers of cabin crew, maintenance crew and pilots that will be required. In the Asia-Pacific region, of course, India plays a major part. It's clear when you look at all the announcements and the growth that's happening in the country. The second component to how we calculate our Aviation Talent Forecast is that we look at the demographic of the active workforce today that's providing the current manpower; whether it's pilot, maintenance, or cabin crew. We look at when are some of these people are expected to retire, when we believe some of these people will leave basically, we look at the anticipated turnover.

After looking at these two sets of data, we map out expectations in terms of how many people are required to be hired and trained over the next decade. Asia-Pacific is the region in which we see the most demand in terms of pilots: we calculate that, some 100,000 pilots will be required in the Asia-Pacific region alone over the next 10 years.