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Korean Air is to recruit over 100 cabin crew, as it restarts hiring after a freeze of nearly three years from the coronavirus pandemic. A statement from the airline on 14 October says it is “preemptively” beginning to recruit more crew members, despite passenger traffic being “still below” pre-pandemic levels. Korean Air adds that the cabin crew recruitment is to “prepare for an increase in traffic”. It is currently flying at around 50% pre-pandemic levels. While the airline did not disclose how many crew members it has now, it states that has “enough manpower” by increasing its employee numbers to over 80%, while operating at current capacity levels. It also notes that while it did not retrench any crew members, a number of them have decided to leave the airline. Korean Air is the latest airline in the region to restart hiring, as border restriction’s lift and travel recovers. In early 2022, Singapore Airlines began recruiting for more cabin crew, and is restarting its cadet pilot training programme. Hong Kong’s Cathay Pacific, meanwhile, is also looking to recruit 700 pilots by 2023, with nearly half being direct-entry hires. Newly-privatised Air India is also hiring more cabin crew, with the airline rolling out a recruitment exercise in July.<br/>

Garuda Indonesia secured Friday approval from its shareholders to launch a right issue in December to raise up to 14.3t rupiah ($929.48m), the company said. The rights issue will allow the government to top up Garuda's capital by 7.5t rupiah, a plan that had been approved by the parliament in April, according to a prospectus for the transaction. The government's additional investment is part of Garuda's promise to debtors to strengthen its capital following the airline's court-supervised debt restructuring programme agreed in June. Garuda plans to offer shares at a price range of 182 to 210 rupiah a piece, meaning in total it would be able to raise up to 14.3t rupiah, including the government's capital top up, if other shareholders fully subscribe to the sale at the highest price. "The company will optimise the additional capital mainly for maintenance, aircraft restoration, fuel, plane leases...The (proceeds) hopefully can strengthen the company's business outlook," CE Irfan Setiaputra said. Shareholders also approved the conversion of 4.2t rupiah worth of liabilities into equity - part of the debt restructuring agreement. Assuming all stakeholders participate in the rights issue at the maximum price, the government's stake in the carrier would shrink to 51.25% from 60.54% previously.<br/>