Moscow, Aug 31 (IANS/RIA Novosti): Russia's aviation authorities are reportedly considering halving the training time for the country's airline pilots in a bid to end a shortage of crew in civil aviation.

The transport ministry thinks the current course structure for pilots - a "leftover" from the Soviet era - is too "academically based" and "too long", Izvestia newspaper reported.

The ministry wants to introduce a western-style Multicrew Pilot's License (MPL) course, in line with International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) guidelines, officials said.

The new course would take just 18 months to complete, and would qualify a pilot for flight on a particular type of aircraft.

The first such course will begin in September, Transport Minister Igor Levitin said.

The ministry is, however, taking a cautious approach to introduce the new system. It is currently only training students who have completed two years of technical education.

A debate in Russia over whether civil pilots need a formal higher education goes back at least 50 years.

In the 1970s, pilots studied in training schools for two years. Currently, they study for three years in training colleges and undertake a five-year flight training course at one of two flight training centres in St. Petersburg or Ulyanovsk.

The three-year college course is academic and includes topics like mathematics, social-economic studies and basic science.

Specialist topics are only studied in the second course, and flight training only in the third. Only after that, graduates get a diploma with a certificate granting them civil pilot status, allowing them to be a line pilot on a civil airline.

Sergei Krasnov, rector of the Ulyanovsk Flight Training School is against the decision to scrap the existing system. He says the school is already cutting down the time it takes to train pilots to four years.

Russian airlines need at least 800 new pilots, an official said. By 2015, they will need at least 1,000.