New Delhi, March 3 (IANS): Dubai based international airline Emirates has reportedly asked its staff to take unpaid leave for up to a month at a time owing to the fast spreading coronavirus, which has disrupted travel and tourism globally.

According to media reports, Emirates Chief Operating Officer Adel al-Redh has said that the airline has more resources than it needs as a result of cutting frequencies or cancelling flights to certain destinations.

The group has over 1 lakh employees who might get impacted due to the airlines cancelling flights at multiple destinations, including China, the epicentre of the coronavirus outbreak.

In a note on the impact of COVID-19 on the Chinese and global economy, IHS Markit said that the disturbance to industrial production and global trade flows and global logistic networks could be more severe due to a drag caused by the prolonged production shutdowns.

If the disease is contained to a large extent to China, it will impact the country the hardest. If it starts to spread outside, the impact could be significantly more severe affecting, in particular, the ASEAN countries (Hong Kong, Singapore, etc.) or Japan, the note said.