GREEN Africa, a local airline, has launched a massive capacity-building program that will train 1,440 pilots, aircraft engineers, and other experts over the next ten years.
The ambitious program intends to produce a glut of key specialists in the local air transport industry, as well as work possibilities for more Nigerians in the rapidly growing local aviation industry.
Babawande Afolabi, the carrier’s founder and CEO, told reporters in Lagos that the ‘g-Future’ program has already begun, with the first group of aspiring pilots and engineers receiving training.
Training pilots and engineers, according to Afolabi, is an expensive undertaking that creates an entry hurdle for talented Nigerians, limiting both operator and industry growth.
“But we have to brave the odds for the sake of the sector. So, over the next decade, we are planning to graduate about 200 captains, about 140 flight dispatchers, about 500 cabin crew, about 100 engineers and about 500 other professionals.
“When we say aviation professionals, some people think of pilots and engineers alone. But there is a whole lot more within the aviation business; you have network planning, aviation and aircraft financing, among the specialties. So, you can see other opportunities for the 500 workforce of professionals.
“We said 10 years, but this is not just going to end after 10 years. So, when we say 200 in 10 years, we already have in view where we would be in 12 months, 18 months and so on. When we approach three years, then already, we are looking at the next 10 years,” Afolabi projected.
Though he wouldn’t say how much the investment cost, the CEO did say that the program started with four young pilots getting type-rated every month, with the goal of becoming captains in four or five years.
Additionally, the Nigerian College of Aviation Technology (NCAT) is training roughly eight Second Officers, as well as cabin crew and technicians.
“There is a shortage and the more folks we train, the easier it is to have manpower and that is part of the key objectives. My fundamental belief is that the fear of trained workers leaving the company afterwards should not hold us back from training them.
“We will go into contractual agreements (with trainees) that ‘Green Africa spent this amount of money to train you and you need to work for Green Africa for this period of time’. If for whatever reason an opportunity comes up and someone needs to leave, it will be negotiated. But it’s not going to be the case that you have a bond that enslaves you. No!
“My hope is that we can get to a certain level like it is done in other parts of the world where someone comes in and says: ‘I like this platform, I’d like to join this platform and I’m willing to pay for my trainees, so tell me how much I am to pay’. There is a module for that, though we are not yet there,” Afolabi said.
Kayode Ajiboye, Director of Airworthiness Standards at the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), praised the initiative, calling it a “strategic move” to grow local content and maintain airline operations.
