Hi Sarah88,
I'm just going to focus on your first question.
Well I don't think that there is shortage of talent in this region. As we all know so far west was leading aviation, so the focus point was there. From running the business even to investing in aviation training. And alongside that people there were persuaded to come to aviation field in order to have their businesses going and they did that by providing scholarships, cadet programs, grants, loans and so on. And even aviation enthusiasts (self-sponsored) knew that there is a market. And today's captains were cadets once upon time.
But now many researches have shown that Asia is going to be leading this industry in a few years. And the main economic development player is Middleast having India and China at the background. So, now it's time for Asian airlines to have those young aviation enthusiast sponsored; people who have dreamt of years becoming pilots, but couldn't any or other reason. And they have to do the capacity building, as those captains were cadets sometime, these cadets are going to be captains in coming years. People who are used to asian life style and many more factors which can reduce the costs in a long term prospect, than having expats in short term. And it seems that some airlines have already thought of this.
Regards,
AvEnthusiast