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Malawi and the United Nations Children Fund have opened the first project of its kind in Africa, an air corridor to test the effectiveness of drones in humanitarian emergencies and development.

The test corridor is centred at the Kasungu Aerodrome, with a 40 kilometre radius with three primary areas of focus: generating aerial images of crisis situations, using drones to extend WI-FI or mobile phone signals across difficult terrain in emergencies and delivering low-weight emergency supplies.

Jappie Mhango, Minister of Transport for Malawi, told CGTN Africa: “Apart from delivering, you know, medical samples to testing laboratories, it can also do a lot of mapping, land surveying and several other important, you know activities.”

Limited road access in many of its rural areas makes it difficult to get help to needy communities.

“You can really see what can drones in terms of transport bring medical supplies to health centres, bring educational supplies to school, what can they do in terms of connectivity in areas where we do not have coverage of telecommunications network,” said Johannes Wedenig, UNICEF Country Representative.

“And they can show we can do with the imagery they acquire in terms of mapping out road networks, mapping out natural environment degradation, mapping out infrastructure. And basically it’s open for private sector to explore and it puts Malawi on the map.”

Landlocked Malawi, which suffers periodic crop failures and is prone to floods, is frequently in need of food and other aid.