By Dickson Omobola
International Air Transport Association, IATA, has disclosed that aircraft delivery shortfalls have reached 5,300 units, saying accumulated losses in deliveries over the past five years and a record-high order backlog could keep the pressure on until 2034.
IATA, in its 2025 analysis of aerospace supply chain bottlenecks, stated that the order backlog had surpassed 17,000 aircraft, almost 60 per cent of the active fleet.
The airline trade association noted that while deliveries of new aircraft picked up in late 2025 and production could accelerate in 2026, demand might outstrip the availability of aircraft and engines.
Speaking on the development, IATA’s Director General, Willie Walsh, said: “Airlines are feeling the impact of the aerospace supply chain challenges across their business. Higher leasing costs, reduced scheduling flexibility, delayed sustainability gains, and increased reliance on suboptimal aircraft types are the most obvious challenges.
“Airlines are missing opportunities to strengthen their top-line, improve their environmental performance, and serve customers. Meanwhile, travellers are seeing higher costs from the resulting tighter demand/supply conditions. No effort should be spared to accelerate solutions before the impact becomes even more acute.”
Causes of delivery delays
Also, IATA stated that delivery delays were compounded by several factors, including airframe production, which was outpacing engine production, longer timelines for new aircraft certification, tariffs on metals and electronics resulting from US-China trade tensions have worsened some supply bottlenecks and raised some maintenance costs, adding that “a shortage of skilled labour, especially in engine and component manufacturing, is constraining production ramp-up plans.
“The fragility of the aerospace supply chain network (often reliant on a limited number of suppliers for critical parts) can become an acute constraint amid economic uncertainty, changing tariff regimes, and tight labor markets. As a result, even small disruptions can be difficult to resolve and balloon to significant production delays.”
Solutions
IATA, however, said to help expedite solutions, there was a need to “open up aftermarket best practices by supporting Maintenance, Repair and Operations, MRO, to be less dependent on OEM-driven commercial licensing models, as well as facilitating access to alternative sourcing for materials and services.
“Enhance supply chain visibility by creating clearer visibility across all supplier levels to spot risks early, reduce bottlenecks and inefficiencies, and use better data and tools to make the whole chain more resilient and reliable.
“Use data more extensively in leveraging predictive maintenance insights, pooling spare parts, and creating shared maintenance data platforms to optimize inventory and reduce downtime.
“Expand repair and parts capacity to accelerate repair approvals, support alternative parts and Used Serviceable Material, USM, solutions, and adopt advanced manufacturing to ease bottlenecks.”
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