By 2030 one in five people will be African. Combine the continent’s soaring population with technology, improvements in infrastructure, health and education, and Africa could be the next century’s economic growth powerhouse. In the past years, African nations have identified the importance space science and technology could have on economic growth and they have been heavily investing in it.

While 28 satellites have been launched by African countries so far (owned by Egypt, Algeria, Angola, Morocco, Ghana, Nigeria, South Africa and Kenya), about 40% of those satellites were launched in about the last 2 years. The space and satellite industry in Africa is booming and 4 more satellites are due for launch before the end of the year by 3 countries.

Satellites launched by African Nations in about the last 2 years.

1. ALSAT 1B – 2016
2. ALSAT 2B – 2016
3. ALSAT 1N – 2016
4. ALCOMSAT-1 2017
5. AngoSat-1 – 2017
6. GhanaSat-1 – 2017
7. 1KUNS-PF – 2018
8. MOHAMMED VI-A – 2017
9. NigeriaEduSAT-1 – 2017
10. nSight1 – 2017
11. ZA-AEROSAT – 2017

Before the end of 2018, we are anticipating the launch of 4 more satellites by 3 African Nations including Morocco, Egypt and South Africa. The satellites are: ZaCube -2 (South Africa), EgyptSat-A (Egypt), XinaBox (Built by South African high school students), Mohammed VI (Morocco). If everything goes as planned, this would bring the number of satellites by African nations to 32.