China will need at least 240,000 civil aviation personnel over the next 20 years, according to the latest report from China Academy of Personnel Science.

As China's civil aviation industry develops at a pace two times faster than the world average, the country faces greater shortages of pilots, crew members and maintenance experts, said the report.

The world average ratio of personnel to aircraft is 100 to 1, while in China the ratio is only 200 to 1.

"China's civil aviation industry will need 10,000 pilots by 2010," said Yu Renlu, an official with the General Administration of Civil Aviation of China (CAAC).

Currently, 90 percent of China's pilots are from the Sichuan-based Civil Aviation Flight University of China (CAFUC), which recruits about 1,000 students a year.

Chinese airlines spend a million yuan (US$123,000) training pilots who study for four years at CAFUC before graduating with a pilot license and a bachelor's degree.

Pilots are often required to sign long-term contracts with the Chinese airlines that have paid for their training. In recent years, an increasing numbers of lawsuits have been reported between domestic airlines and pilots who want to quit their jobs to work for foreign or privately-owned airlines that offer higher salaries.

To meet the demand for new pilots, CAFUC should enroll more students and find alternative ways to pay for their training, said Yu.

He said in the future, pilots should pay for their own training, allowing them to choose which airline they want to work for after graduation.