By Abhijith Ganapavaram

NEW DELHI, March 18 (Reuters) -

Air India CEO Campbell Wilson on Tuesday said the global

aircraft shortage hampering airline growth will persist for four

to five years as supply snags hobble production at jetmakers

Boeing ( BA ) and Airbus.

Speaking at an event organised by travel news website

Skift, Wilson said he sees pinch points in the supply of

narrowbody jet engines, business and first class seats, and some

elements of aircraft fuselages.

Air India is in the midst of an ambitious turnaround

strategy two years after Tata Group took control of the airline,

but its restructuring efforts have been complicated by jet

delivery delays.

These

setbacks

have forced the airline to operate older jets longer than

planned, increasing maintenance costs and slowing its

modernization and expansion drive.

When asked about how Air India plans to navigate delays,

Wilson told reporters: "There is not a lot we can do. We are

victims of circumstance, as is every other airline."

"If you are capacity constrained, you need to be a

little bit more ruthless with respect to where you deploy

aircraft to mazimise the return," he added. "It means you can't

expand to places you would otherwise like to expand."

The competition among airlines to lease aircraft and the

different configurations available make leasing aircraft

challenging, Wilson added.

In 2023, as a part of the multi-billion-dollar revamp,

Air India ordered 470 jets from Airbus and Boeing ( BA ), including 10

of the U.S. planemaker's much-delayed 777X aircraft and 190

Boeing 737 MAX jets.

Late last year, the airline ordered 100 more Airbus

aircraft.

When asked about delivery timelines for 777X, Wilson

said, "Who knows?" His comment underlined uncertainty among

airlines who have ordered the jet that is considered a successor

to Boeing's ( BA ) 777, one of the most commercially successful

long-haul airliners.

Last month,

Wilson told Reuters

Air India was holding off on exercising its outstanding

options to buy additional Boeing ( BA ) jets until the planemaker has

cleared its backlog.

Boeing ( BA ) is recovering from a near two-month crippling

worker strike

last year. The planemaker

cannot produce more than 38 737 MAX aircraft per month

because of a cap set by the U.S. Federal Aviation

Administration.

Boeing ( BA ) did not immediately respond to a Reuters request

for comment.