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| A worker moves piles of empty meal carts at an in-flight meal production facility operated by Korean Air in Incheon, Thursday. / Korea Times photo by Shim Hyun-chul |
By Jun Ji-hye
In-flight meal providers are suffering as air carriers have halted most international flights amid the global COVID-19 pandemic, airline industry officials said Friday.
Airline food suppliers have reduced the operations of their production facilities, while their subcontractors have forced some employees to go on unpaid leave or resign amid deepening financial difficulties.
An in-flight meal center operated by Korean Air had produced 71,000 meals a day on average last year, but its daily production fell to 3,700 at the end of March.
The production is expected to decrease further to about 3,000 soon, according to officials there.
Before the COVID-19 outbreak the center, located near Incheon International Airport, supplied in-flight meals to about 200 international flights every day, including those operated by Korean Air.
But on Thursday, the meals were supplied to only 14 flights including 12 Korean Air planes.
Subcontractors that have dispatched production workers to the center have been hit hard as well, leading them to cut personnel ― the number of workers working at the center has decreased to 300 from 1,300.
"This is an unprecedented crisis. It was unimaginable that daily production could fall to below 30,000 even when the nation was hit by the SARS and MERS viruses," said Kim Se-yong who is in charge of the in-flight meal business at Korean Air. "Without government support, air carriers and in-flight meal suppliers would go out of business in a few months."
There are about four in-flight meal providers near Incheon International Airport, including Gate Gourmet Korea that supplies meals to Asiana Airlines.
Gate Gourmet Korea operates a two-story production facility that is 25,550 square meters in size.
"Gate Gourmet Korea produced 35,000 meals for Asiana Airlines every day before the COVID-19 outbreak, but now, it is producing fewer than 1,000 meals," an Asiana Airlines official said.
Industry officials said it will not be easy for airlines and in-flight meal suppliers to overcome their financial troubles for the time being as they need to wait for the COVID-19 situation to come to an end, and for air travel demand to recover.
The Korea Civil Aviation Association expects domestic airlines to suffer a loss of 6.45 trillion won ($5.2 billion) from February to June.
"The government should come up with more active measures to support the industry, expanding support funds and beneficiaries," an airline industry official said.
