Japan · China · The Guardian Technology
Humanoid robots to become baggage handlers in Japan airport experiment
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Japan’s famously conscientious but overburdened baggage handlers will soon be joined by extra staff at Tokyo’s Haneda airport, although their new colleagues will need to take regular recharging breaks.
Key facts
- JAL and its partner in the initiative, Japan Airlines GMO Internet Group, hope the experiment, which ends in 2028, will lessen the burden on human employees amid a surge in inbound tourism
- The Chinese-made humanoids will move travellers’ luggage and cargo on the tarmac at Haneda, which handles more than 60 million passengers a year
- According to one estimate, Japan will need more than 6.5 million foreign workers in 2040 to reach its growth targets as the indigenous workforce continues to shrink
- The president of JAL Ground Service, Yoshiteru Suzuki, said using robots to perform physically demanding work would “inevitably reduce the burden on workers and provide significant benefits
Summary
Japan Airlines will introduce humanoid robots on a trial basis from the beginning of May, with a view to deploying them permanently as a solution to the country’s chronic labour shortage. The Chinese-made humanoids will move travellers’ luggage and cargo on the tarmac at Haneda, which handles more than 60 million passengers a year. JAL and its partner in the initiative, Japan Airlines GMO Internet Group, hope the experiment, which ends in 2028, will lessen the burden on human employees amid a surge in inbound tourism and forecasts of more severe labour shortages. In a demonstration for the media this week, a 130cm-tall robot manufactured by Hangzhou-based Unitree was seen tentatively “pushing” cargo on to a conveyer belt next to a JAL passenger plane and waving to an unseen colleague.