Tunisair cuts jobs and steps in for A320neo in competitiveness bid

State-owned Tunisair is to shed around 1,000 jobs as part of a national austerity plan and a bid to make the airline more competitive. The job losses will affect around 12% of the full-time workforce of around 8,200.

Prime Minister Youssef Chahed has promised his new government will take tough decisions to help the economy grow and create jobs as the country comes under pressure from international lenders to push through reforms and trim public spending. State-owned firms are believed to have incurred losses of around $1.5bn last year.
Senior executives in Tunisair have commented in the past about the unwieldiness of the operation and the redundancy programme has been agreed with the major unions who have recognized the need for greater competitiveness.
Around a half of the job losses will be voluntary and according to Reuters the airline has put aside about $50 million for compensation.

Meanwhile, the airline has ordered five Airbus A320neo narrowbodies having apparently swapped a batch of outstanding Airbus orders according to the latest backlog details released by the OEM.
Tunisair had previously ordered 10 A320s, as well as three Airbus A350-800s and three A330s, during a fleet-modernisation deal in 2008 but subsequently cancelled the A350s , one of the A330s. and four of the A320s