SYDNEY: The head of Australian airline Qantas on Tuesday predicted the aviation industry would shed 100,000 jobs worldwide by the end of the year as high fuel costs force massive restructuring.

Qantas chief executive Geoff Dixon, who last week announced the carrier would axe 1,500 jobs from its global workforce, said the high cost of fuel would result in a "new aviation world order".

"Right now, airlines around the world are cutting routes and capacity, grounding and retiring aircraft and unfortunately shedding staff," Dixon told a business function in Sydney.

"It's likely that 100,000 jobs will be lost before the calendar year is out."

The Qantas chief – who has guided the airline through downturns sparked by crises such as SARS, the 9/11 attacks and the Iraq war in his eight years at the helm – said fuel costs were fundamentally changing the industry.

"The global aviation industry faces not just a shock or indeed a blip or indeed a crisis really, but a permanent transformation," he said.

Dixon believed that the United States would eventually ease restrictions on foreigners owning more than 25 percent of the voting stock in US airlines, sparking a new wave of consolidation in the industry.

He predicted long-established airline brands would remain but that the number of airline owners in the market place would dwindle.

"We believe strongly at Qantas that over time, consolidation will transform aviation," he said.

"It will produce a few very large and extremely efficient global airlines with a portfolio of interests and a portfolio of brands – the brands won't go."

Dixon last week estimated rising fuel costs had added two billion dollars (1.94 billion US) to Qantas' fuel bill this year as he announced the 1,500 job cuts and the abandonment of plans to hire another 1,200 people.

Qantas also last week cut its estimated capacity growth for 2008-09 from eight percent to zero and announced it would retire up to 22 older aircraft from its fleet.

Qantas shares closed down two cents at 3.39 dollars in an overall market that was down 0.1 percent.


- AFP/so