African governments are among the least friendly in the world when it comes to support for drone flying.  Several governments ban the practice outright, while others have a cumbersome permit approval system in place that largely discourages it. But none of these obstacles have deterred enterprising young drone enthusiasts on the continent from seizing the initiative and finding innovative ways to take flight.

A good example is Nigerian-born Bolaji Fataiy, whose lifelong dream is to become a professional aeronautical engineer.  Despite growing up in poverty in the slums surrounding Lagos, the nation’s capital, and in the face of the country’s regulatory barriers, Fataiy has spent years collecting used styrofoam and other scrap materials to assemble the airframe and wings for his drone.  In recent months, his efforts have won him an award and a grant from a foreign technology company to build more homemade drones.  Thanks to his unbridled passion and ingenuity, Fataiy’s fast on his way to becoming a successful drone entrepreneur.

Another enterprising Nigerian, Stephen Ndukwu, had the wherewithal to purchase his first commercial drone several years ago and now claims to earn a full-time six-figure income filming aerial videos for real estate developers, far and away the country’s top drone industry.  He also shoots footage of the country’s landmarks and vistas and sells it at premium prices to tourist companies.  As the nation’s drone industry has expanded, he’s also begun teaching classes and training Nigeria’s next generation of drone pilots.  His galloping success, like Fataiy’s, is indicative of the visionary zeal that is driving the development of the drone industry worldwide.

Not all enterprising drone enthusiasts in Nigeria and elsewhere insist on going it alone, however.  In Tanzania, local communities and nonprofits have supported the development of small indigenous drone companies under the banner of “Self-Reliance,” the nation’s reigning economic and social development philosophy dating to the 1970’s.  Many of these new companies have relied on locally collected “all-natural” materials to build their drones, in some cases, constructing them almost completely from bamboo shoots, another sign of the remarkable ingenuity of African drone makers.  These days nearly everyone with the desire to fly a drone in Tanzania can do so, as long as they can acquire a few pieces of duct tape needed to keep the video camera in place.

By contrast, in Rwanda, indigenous drone companies have linked their fortunes to larger foreign firms, including Zipline, the Silicon Valley-based drone firm that has pioneered the aerial delivery of medical supplies by drone throughout the African continent.  Zipline, as part of its agreement with the Rwandan government, has provided training, drones and technology support to some of the local Rwandans currently in its employ to allow them to develop the nation’s first Rwandan-owned and managed drone firms, Zipline has since expanded its operations to Ghana and several other African countries, sparking additional spin-off activity along the way.

Much of Africa now appears poised to develop a continent-wide drone industry.  The region’s vast unpopulated deserts and grasslands and arid weather, coupled with sporadic road infrastructure networks, make aerial surveying and cargo delivery optimal for commercial purposes.  More regulatory development and coordination to eliminate the patchwork of rules governing commercial drone flying would accelerate the industry’s pace of development.  And fewer restrictions on private drone flying in particular could allow a new generation of determined pioneers like Fataiy to take flight and fulfill their dreams of becoming world class aviators.