#Qatar Airways Set to Slash Thousands of More Jobs in Coming Weeks

Qatar Airways Set to Slash Thousands of More Jobs in Coming Weeks

Despite managing to grow its network to more than 120 destinations around the world even amidst ever-tightening travel restrictions prompted by a second wave of the Covid pandemic, Qatar Airways says it will be forced to lay off even more employees over the coming weeks.

During the first wave, Qatar Airways chief executive Akbar Al Baker told local television in Doha the airline had made around 15 per cent of its worldwide workforce redundant in order to cut costs in the face of plummeting demand for air travel.

In the next round of redundancies, Al Baker predicted that the airline would have to trim its workforce by a further 5 per cent. The redundancies will be in the thousands but Al Baker claims layoffs are significantly less than other airlines, especially regional rivals including the Dubai-based Emirates

“Every single airline has laid off people in very large numbers because large amounts of the fleet has been grounded,” Al Baker told Qatar TV. “When you look at [it] proportionality on Qatar Airways, we have done the minimum reduction.”