Details of Changi East developments out soon

Details of developments at Changi East will be made known to the public soon.

Some developments in the works include a mega-passenger terminal to cater to more passengers and a third runway for Changi Airport.

Minister of State for Finance and Transport, Mrs Josephine Teo, said the inter-agency Changi 2036 Steering Committee, has completed "a major part of its work".

Mrs Teo was speaking on the sidelines of the third Aviation Open House on Thursday morning.

The Changi 2036 Steering Committee is tasked with looking into Changi airport's future needs, including the masterplan for development at Changi East.

The work includes the scale and timeline of the development.

Channel NewsAsia understood details will likely be shared around the period when the National Day Rally speech is delivered.

Mrs Teo elaborated: "We have to study many things because it is not just building a terminal or just getting the runway ready. There are also things we have to consider, like the future availability of land, space for logistics players. Once you have logistics there, for the convenience of passengers, we have to think through vehicular access. Vehicular access is itself a very serious study. That part is more or less completed. We have arrived at some decisions."

To complement such developments, talent is key.

Mrs Teo said: "Today, the industry provides more than 50,000 core aviation jobs. There is already a wide spectrum of career options open to Singaporeans from diverse backgrounds. Given the plans we have set in motion for the development of Changi East, it is quite clear that Singapore Aviation will provide many more quality jobs in the future that will challenge the best of minds and those with passion."

The biennial Aviation Open House brings together more than 45 aviation-related organisations and educational institutions.

Divesh Singaraju, an aerospace engineering student at Singapore Polytechnic, said: "I was four years old when I took a plane to US with my parents. And from then on, my parents always said I would be very amazed by the way the plane flies. That really diverted me towards planes, but I was not sure whether to be a pilot or an engineer. As time went by, I realised that I was more of a hands-on guy so I went towards the engineering path."

Companies hope to attract aviation enthusiasts like Divesh to work in the sector.

Robert Mazurkivich, general manager of global services engineering (Asia) at Pratt & Whitney, said: "We typically recruit in Singapore at the major universities. We also would like to embellish the relationship with the polytechnics here and get in the ground floor and start to build relationship in the first and second year of schools.

"We have a lot of cyclical business and we also recruit for hiring needs to staff our current needs as well as our growing businesses. Some of the recruiting challenges we face today are finding skilled professionals in mechanical and aerospace engineering."

More than 8,000 visitors are expected at the event. As part of the three-day event, there will be a recruitment exercise on July 26.

Over 300 pre-selected job seekers will be interviewed by eight aviation organisations.

Collectively, these organisations have more than 200 job vacancies.

SOURCE