A COMPREHENSIVE DATABASE OF AFRICAN DRONE REGULATIONS
The World Bank Group and World Economic Forum are supporting the African Drone Forum in a review of all regulations that pertain to Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS), commonly known as drones, throughout Africa. This research takes stock of existing regulations, ongoing policy dialogues, and potential regulatory vacuums. The research outcomes also serve as a baseline for future discussions on priorities for collaboration on advancing safe, secure, and enabling drone regulations. Any relevant regulatory updates this research has identified have been added to the existing droneregulations.info database, which is mirrored below.
The African Drone Forum, in collaboration with its partners, continues to highlight opportunities for drones in Africa to improve medical supply chains, connect isolated areas to commercial opportunities, and assist with disaster response. This regulations review will ensure that countries seeking to expand their support for drones are able to do so in partnership and assistance from the broader international community.
The research effort seeks to engage with National Civil Aviation Authorities (NCAAs) as we look to bring this community of aviation leaders from across Africa together, both in person and virtually, to advance safe, secure, and impactful drone regulations.
The ADF Regulators Summit
Governments around the world are looking to enable new drone applications that provide social and economic value, but often struggle to find ways to approve the use of drones while maintaining public safety, security, and trust. African countries are leading the world in finding new ways to manage drones.
The Regulators Summit at the African Drone Forum brought together more than 60 regulators from 26 African countries. The summit focused on highlighting policy innovation from Africa and around the world, and provided an opportunity for participants to review and design new approaches to the management of drones. The goal was to enable participants to develop a roadmap for approving new operations using drones and to share their experiences using drones. Presentations from African experts and international governing bodies in aviation highlighted the opportunity and experience of enabling these operations and highlighted new guidance for review. Follow-up research on the current status of drone regulations in Africa can be accessed here.