Five Turkish citizens are set to be among the 18 operators assigned to start up and run the first unit of Türkiye's Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant, Akkuyu Nuclear JSC Board Chair Anton Dedusenko said recently.

Speaking to Anadolu Agency(AA) during "World Atomic Days," a Rosatom event held on the sidelines of the COP31 U.N. climate summit in Antalya, Dedusenko said the operators had passed qualification exams administered by Rosatom and that Türkiye's nuclear regulator had approved the results.

"We plan to train around 600 Turkish engineers as part of the Akkuyu project. More than half of them are already working at the plant," he said.

Some of these engineers will help start up and operate the first unit, Dedusenko said, adding that they would be the first Turkish citizens to work as operators at a nuclear power plant.

Dedusenko, meanwhile, described the Akkuyu plant as one of Türkiye's largest foreign direct investments and said the project's contribution to the country's gross domestic product (GDP) was expected to exceed $50 billion.

The plant will employ at least 4,000 people, including Turkish and Russian citizens, once all four units are operational, he said. Each job at the plant is expected to create 10 additional jobs in other sectors across the region, he added.

Dedusenko said 35,000 people had worked at the site at the peak of construction, and that the workforce had since declined as the first unit approached commissioning.

The project had also contributed to improvements in local infrastructure, he said, noting that newly built roads had shortened travel times to the plant.

Energy and Natural Resources Minister Alparslan Bayraktar separately said that Türkiye plans to begin the physical start-up of its first nuclear power reactor at the Akkuyu plant within weeks.