Japan yesterday launched a task force to study struggling Japan Airlines’ (JAL) rehabilitation plan, looking to map out a strategy within a month, the transport ministry said.
Seiji Maehara, the transport minister, appointed five experts on industrial revitalization to form the task force a day after Asia’s largest carrier sought a public bailout to survive after being hit by the economic downturn.
“I would like you to play the central role in mapping out JAL’s revival plan,” Maehara told the experts at their first meeting, adding that the move would help Japan’s tourism sector and the country’s prosperity.
The task force was launched after Japan’s new center-left government promised to overhaul the JAL restructuring set in motion under the previous conservative administration, which was defeated in an election last month.
Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama — in the US for UN and G20 summits this week — said he wanted to see a “a new scheme, not the one built by the former government” to restructure the airline.
“The [JAL] president has submitted a new revival plan, but we, the new government, need to study thoroughly how realistic and doable it is,” Hatoyama told reporters in Pittsburgh, where he is attending the G20 summit.
Among the panel members is Shinjiro Takagi, former chairman of the now-defunct Industrial Revitalization Corp of Japan, which assisted a number of heavily indebted firms from 2003 to 2007.
JAL, which lost more than US$1 billion in the April to June quarter, has announced plans to slash 6,800 jobs and pursue a tie-up with a foreign carrier as part of efforts to return to profit.
JAL president Haruka Nishimatsu met Maehara on Thursday and sought a public bailout, but the government gave a cool response to the request, with the minister saying the business revival plan was “insufficient.”
The carrier has already received three government bailouts since 2001.
JAL has forecast a net loss of ¥63 billion (US$690 million) in the year to next March, after a ¥63.2 billion deficit last year.
Nishimatsu said last week that JAL aimed to seal a tie-up with an overseas carrier by the middle of next month, without naming any potential partners.
Local media reported Delta Air Lines is considering taking a stake in JAL.
American Airlines, British Airways and Qantas are also reported to have made a joint offer, while Air France-KLM is seen as another possible partner.
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