After the pandemic, the aviation industry in the world is facing a new problem, which is the lack of professional staff. This problem is increasingly pronounced in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the director of the Air Navigation Services Agency (BHANSA) Davorin Primorac says that it is especially important to ensure a sufficient number of flight controllers, who are increasingly choosing to accept calls for better-paid jobs in Qatar and other rich countries.
“Air navigation service providers have been faced with a chronic shortage of air traffic controllers for many years and as a result generate significant delays. Therefore, the price of work for air traffic controllers is high, and their salaries in the countries of Western Europe and the Middle East exceed EUR 12,000 per month. In addition, many service providers have constantly open tenders for air traffic controllers because they are not able to train a sufficient number of controllers for their needs in a timely manner. Migrations, even in this highly regulated profession, have become an everyday occurrence, and we are witnessing this for the first time,” warns Primorac.
BHANSA today has a large number of highly qualified and highly specialized personnel in which huge resources have been invested to reach and maintain the high required standards.
“We currently have 143 air traffic controllers, of which 70 are regional and 73 approach/airport controllers. Our area controllers work in a demanding and complex airspace where, for example, 9.7. provided overflight services for 1,700 flights this year. With such competencies and references, they are attractive on the international labor market, so we already have a situation where 10 regional controllers have submitted applications for work in Qatar, which is establishing its regional controller this year, for a salary of USD 16,000, and a slightly smaller number are interested and for Germany,” points out Primorac.
In addition to regional air traffic controllers, BiH also has a number of technical and support personnel interesting to the market. BHANSA has faced these challenges before, but so far they have been isolated cases of departure.
Primorac says that BHANSA recognized these problems in time, which it plans to overcome with its own training of the necessary staff, about which it also informed the state Ministry of Transport and Communications.
“In order to meet the upcoming challenges in a timely manner, BHANSA has short-term plans to train air traffic controllers and improve services. Our mid-term and long-term goals include the completion of the establishment of an air traffic controller training center, which will ultimately be certified for training controllers from the selection stage to the final license. This will enable us to train each next generation of air traffic controllers with our own resources and entirely within BiH, i.e. BHANSA. In this way, we will actively deal with the problem of staff deficit in our sector and train controllers not only for our own needs but also for foreign air navigation service providers. In the future, therefore, we will not depend on others and be forced to sign agreements with other countries to provide services in our airspace because we ourselves are not capable,” Primorac points out.
He reminds that precisely the lack of professionally trained staff and the absence of air traffic controllers was the main reason why Bosnia and Herzegovina waited so long to independently start providing services in this area.
