Despite the potential of drone technology, the relatively new industry is becoming complex for its regulation while civil aviation authorities try to balance between the application of commercial unmanned aviation, safety and security concerns in the airspace.

In East Africa and across the continent unmanned aircraft are being used for humanitarian interventions in remote areas, healthcare, mapping initiatives in the region, crops monitoring, photography among others but industry players say the lack of proper regulations and restrictions are hindering the uptake of the Industry.

Rwanda is among few countries in East Africa and the continent that have ap+proved proper Drone regulation that was revised in 2018. Eric Rutayisire, founder of Charis UAV, a drone company from Rwanda said the drone regulation has allowed only serious players to join the industry.

Fighting malaria

However, some have raised concerns over “restrictions” such as charges for some operations like flying drones that could hinder the use of certain technology and lock out some who would be interested in joining the sector.

“This is like traditional aviation sector, and the reason why we do not have hundreds of airlines,” Mr Rutayisire said. The regulations were revised in 2018 but the industry is still nascent with few operators.

The sector that appears to have benefited in the use of drones is healthcare where the unmanned  aircraft are used to transfer blood and medical supplies to remote hospital across the country, in a projected initiated by an American drone company that has now expanded to Ghana.

Charis UAV recently started a pilot project to fight malaria using drone spray to kill mosquitos in  wetlands. Neighbouring Tanzania has also used drone in fighting malaria. In 2018, Kenya’s parliament refused to approve the Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems, the Regulations 2017 over safety and privacy concerns.

Now, drone operators in the country hope the regulations will be approved by parliament this February and revive the industry they say it has been collapsed as results of the indirect ban imposed two years ago.

Craig Leave, founder of Kendrone Ltd, a drone company that offers training services and aerial surveys told The EastAfrican there is a lack of understanding of unmanned aviation.

Public engagement According to Mr Leave, who is a former airline pilot in Kenya the regulations in Kenya were cancelled in June 2018 and reasons cited were the lack of a public engagement to the development of the regulations and disagreement over some fines.

Other reasons were safety, security and privacy concerns. Mr Leave believes those reasons were not enough. As a result of cancellation there are not administrative channels to issue licenses and other administrative tasks. Some players have now turned to foreign markets as the industry has been collapsed while others fly drones illegally.

Leka Tingitanya, managing director of Tanzanian Flying Lab in Tanzania, robotics and company said in Tanzania drones are mainly in conservation, healthcare, mapping, disaster management.

The flagship project in Tanzania is the ‘Zanzibar mapping initiative’ said to be the largest drone mapping initiative in the world. The project started in 2016 which volunteers used drones data to map the island.