Coffee Box at Chennai airport to energise visitors and empower differently-abled

CHENNAI: The Airports Authority of India (AAI), in association with Travel Food Services, a private company, has set up a coffee shop at the Chennai International Airport, which is managed by speech and hearing impaired individuals, said a statement from the company.

The initiative is aimed for inclusion of differently-abled persons in mainstream and as well as creating unique employment opportunities for them. The statement said the existing team members at Chennai International Airport, including senior coaches, managers and HR teams, were put through special sign language training, to be able to connect to the team of the shop named ‘Coffee Box’.

S Sreekumar, director, Chennai Airport, said, “We are always striving towards helping all segments of society when it comes to our business practices. Apart from the physical transformation, we have associated with TFS to bring a unique opportunity to create long-term employment opportunities to the specially-abled individuals.”

While executive director of Travel Food Services, Varun Kapur said, “Our aim is to provide training to the specially-abled candidates, to ensure a useful skillset is imparted that enables one to earn a living with dignity in their life ahead. This launch is our way of creating such a positive impact and atmosphere at one of the busiest airports of India. Currently, we have 7 specially-abled members as part of the Coffee Box team, and we hope to provide opportunities to enable an increase in this diverse workforce in the near future.”