Will Tanzania's Drone Industry Take Off?
Business Daily
BBC
4.4 • 816 Ratings
🗓️ 28 January 2019
⏱️ 18 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Drones have been used increasingly in Africa for survey and mapping, but will cargo drone delivery companies be the next big thing? Jane Wakefield visits Mwanza on the banks of Lake Victoria to speak to African and international companies hoping to cash in on the drone delivery market. During a trial for a big World Bank project called The Lake Victoria Challenge Jane speaks to the Tanzanian drone pilot making waves across the continent, to the global start ups innovating rapidly, and to one drone company helping to map Cholera outbreaks in Malawi. Jane hears from Helena Samsioe from Globhe, Edward Anderson from the World Bank, Frederick Mbuya from Uhurulabs, Leka Tingitana Tanzania Flying Labs and others.
(Photo: A delivery drone in Tanzania, Credit: Sala Lewis/Lake Victoria Challenge)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Not a swarm of giant bees, but drones, taking off and landing from Mawanza on the shores of Lake Victoria, Tanzania. |
| 0:16.8 | This is Business Daily on the BBC World Service with me, Jane Wakefield. |
| 0:26.3 | And today we'll be exploring the potential for drone technology in this rapidly changing part of the world. |
| 0:33.4 | We'll be hearing from some of Tanzania's young drone pilots about their hopes for the future |
| 0:38.4 | and from the global start-ups innovating rapidly |
| 0:41.5 | to help engineer change. |
| 0:44.1 | That is going to be one of the crucial things |
| 0:47.1 | that we're going to be doing at the Tanzania Flying Labs |
| 0:49.3 | is we're going to have a certified repair center |
| 0:52.8 | right here in Tanzania, most likely in Dar Salaam. |
| 1:01.0 | We cannot only use them as a tool which is made outside of Africa, |
| 1:04.0 | but we have to do as much as we can to encourage the youth to see this as a potential career path |
| 1:10.0 | where they could actually do something which is innovative |
| 1:12.5 | and make money as well. |
| 1:19.5 | Drones have come a long way since being regarded as toys for hobbyists. |
| 1:24.3 | Now they support some of the biggest industries on the planet. |
| 1:27.4 | They serve a plethora |
| 1:28.4 | of humanitarian needs too, search and rescue after natural disasters and the monitoring of flood-prone |
| 1:34.8 | areas. We may be some way from the likes of Amazon dropping parcels by drone as the retail |
| 1:42.2 | giant's chief executive Jeff Bezos famously predicted years ago. |
| 1:46.6 | But in one corner of Tanzania, cargo drone deliveries are becoming a reality. |
| 1:51.8 | I'd really forgotten about drones until about 2015 when we were asked to take a sort of fresh |
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