An Airline Ab Initio Flight Training Program in the United Arab Emirates (UAE): An Analytical Approach toward Emiratization

The continuous establishment and expansion of UAE airlines has led to a demand for qualified pilots in the region of the Persian Gulf. The shortage of UAE national pilots has compelled the local airlines to employ pilots with foreign nationalities. Though the UAE government has implemented a program within the Emirates to increase the number of nationals in the work force (referred to as Emiratization), there has been little headway within the aviation sector. As a result, this thesis was undertaken to develop an ab initio training program that would increase the percentage of UAE nationals among the UAE airline pilots’ population. The project has fallen within the guidelines of some US voluntary programs, such as the Advanced Qualification Program (AQP) and the FAA/lndustry Training Standards (FITS). The analysis of data acquired from an airline\u27s ab initio program has aided in a new proposal for flight training in the UAE