South Korea’s major aircraft manufacturer Korea Aerospace Industries Ltd. (KAI) is hiring talented engineers from the country’s shipbuilding industry who have lost their jobs amid the ongoing industry-wide intensive restructuring led by the Korean government. KAI hopes its move can partly contribute to stabilizing the country’s labor market and preventing skilled local workers from leaving the country in search of jobs overseas.

A senior KAI official who asked to be unnamed said the company has so far hired 74 former engineers from 11 shipbuilding companies including the top three Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co., Hyundai Heavy Industries Co., and Samsung Heavy Industries Co. Those workers were shipbuilding experts who have recently lost their jobs during the industry-wide restructuring, and KAI plans to hire total 94 experienced engineers who left the industry this year including those from shipbuilders’ contractors, the official added.

Next year, KAI plans to offer additional 200 positions for laid-off staff from the shipbuilding industry.

Industry observers note that KAI has decided to come forward to offer jobs to those laid-off workers as the company shares the pain of losing jobs after its employees also went through the massive restructuring that swept the country’s aircraft industry during the Asian financial crisis in late 1990s.

To salvage the nation’s aircraft industry suffering from chronic losses, the Korean government orchestrated a big deal in 1999 to merge three aerospace manufacturers - Daewoo Heavy Industries, Samsung Aerospace, and Hyundai Space and Aircraft Company - to set up KAI. As the result of the big deal, many workers in the industry were forced out of jobs and watched their companies perishing.

Entering 2016, the Korean government has accelerated its efforts to reform the nation’s backbone industry shipbuilding sector that is grappling with shrinking orders amid the prolonged slump in the global economy and oil prices. The top three shipbuilders, also the world’s three largest, are expected to cut 32 percent of their combined workforce from 62,000 to 42,000 employees and reduce the number of docks by 23 percent from 31 to 24 by 2018.

KAI has its head office and production base in Sacheon, South Gyeongsang, close to the country’s so-called shipbuilding belt that includes Korea’s southern coastal cities including Ulsan, Geoje, and Tongyeong, which might be one of factors that has also encouraged KAI to recruit those laid-off but skilled engineers from the shipbuilding industry, industry experts said.

By Kim Jung-hwan

[ⓒ Pulse by Maeil Business News Korea & mk.co.kr, All rights reserved]