Carnival hiring in Italy again

Genoa - “Our goal, under the direction of Neil Palomba [the current president of Costa Cruises, ed.], is additional growth in terms of personnel in Genoa. Michael Thamm, the CEO of the Costa Group said, “In 2016, we concentrated our technical administration in Hamburg as well as our monitoring centre for the Carnival Maritime’s Costa, Aida, P&O and Cunard fleets,” which employs 180 people. The Carnival Group brought AidaPerla to Genoa, which has a tonnage of 124 tonnes, carries 3,300 passengers, and was the second unit produced by the troubled commission from the Japanese builder Mitsubishi (it was delayed one year, with $2.4 million in penalties for the shipyard, which decided to exit the cruise ship business after this experience). The gesture was a strong signal of its commitment to Italy: the crest ceremony took place yesterday morning, and then in the evening 1,000 Costa employees met Carnival CEO Arnold Donald. Carnival controls the Genoese group with the Costa and Aida brands - 3.5 billion in revenue in 2016.

Thamm explained, “In Genoa we strengthened the acquisitions division, which has dozens of employees, and the sales divisions, finance, IT and the call centre remain here. Consider us a tree with very strong roots, which cannot be pulled out of the ground after so many years.” In support of this consolidation of relations with Italy, Carnival has announced about 4,500 new hires for Italian on-board personnel by 2022, mainly to be employed on the 17 new ships on order, six of which are for Costa and Aida - the majority will be group leaders, hostesses, and hotel personnel but also a large number of on-board officers, estimated at 700 to 800 persons. In this sense one could say that from the present to 2022, the Carnival Group will double the size of its Italian workforce, which is currently 5,000. Thamm recalls that the Costa and Aida brands are now the only two Italian-flagged lines in the cruise sector, and with 27 ships (and 76,000 beds) the Genoese fleet is the largest Italian-flagged passenger fleet. Donald pointed out that “Carnival Corporation is among the largest foreign investors in Italy, which is a strategic country for our growth. Since 1990 we have built 68 ships in Italian shipyards for several of our group’s brands, plus another ten units are currently on order or under construction, for an overall investment of about €32 billion.

Fincantieri will always be our best partner.” With an operation that has received little attention - but which was anticipated by TTM in an interview with Carnival’s Vice President Franco Porcellacchia - the American group bought the majority stake (60%) of Ecospray, based in Alzano Scrivia. With its 70 employees, both engineers and administrative staff, the company designs catalytic systems for ships. Carnival’s goal is to equip half of its fleet of 103 units with scrubbers by 2020 (the year in which the IMO restrictions of ship emissions take effect). “We contribute to Liguria’s economy,” Thamm pointed out, “at €450 million per year, bringing about one third of the passengers to Ligurian ports (the Savona terminal employs twenty people and generates 660 jobs in associated companies), plus our direct taxes in Italy which are worth €2 billion and our four million passengers,” of which Costa accounts for 55%. AidaPerla left the shipyard in Nagasaki at the end of April, German tour operators embarked on 25 May in Limassol for a test voyage (the ship is mainly sold to Central Europeans), and it will start regular service in the Western Mediterranean tomorrow with departures for Palma de Mallorca, where the ship will be christened on 30 May.