Zambia has completed the construction of a ground receiving station which it says will pave the way for the launch of the country's long-awaited first satellite.
According to a Facebook post from Zambia’s technology and science minister Felix Chipota Mutati on Saturday, the government has spent over US$14 million to build the ground receiving station, which is located in the Chibombo district in Central Province.
Mutati said experts are now testing the station as they prepare to go into phase two of the preparations to launch the satellite. Mutati gave no details on when the satellite launch will take place, or any details about the satellite itself, apart from it being an earth-observation satellite.
Zambia has been planning to launch its own earth-observation satellite for several years now to address challenges brought on by climate change in agriculture, land use, health and energy.
As we reported last month, one of the casualties of climate change in Zambia has been its electricity grid. Lake Kariba – formed by the Kariba Dam, which generates electricity for Zambia and Zimbabwe – has lost 98% of its water, according to a January 2023 report from LifeGate Daily. That has forced state-owned power utility ZESCO to increase the length of power blackouts from six hours to 12 hours to keep the power grid from failing completely.
That in turn has led to mobile operators in Zambia struggling to cope with the impact of the blackouts on their ability to keep their cell sites running.
According to the Lukasata Times, Mutati said in November 2021 that a satellite would be the most crucial component in dealing with climate change. At the time, Mutati set the goal of launching a satellite by 2023.
However, Zambia has had to deal with the more pressing issue of its crippling economic crisis brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic. Zambia defaulted on its debt payments in November 2020, and underwent a US$13.4 billion debt restructuring under the G20’s 'Common Framework' architecture that was only completed in June 2024.
Nevetheless, Mutati said the Zambian government “is committed to launching a satellite which will help in agriculture, forestry, ground water management and other sectors.”
A growing number of African countries are banking on satellite technology to manage resources to cope with climate change. Senegal is the latest country on the continent to launch a satellite, which went into orbit on Friday to help government agencies improve resource management, improve weather forecasting and aviation safety.
According to SpaceHubs Africa, 61 satellites have been launched by 17 countries in Africa as of August 19. South Africa and Egypt have the most with 13 satellites each, with Nigeria a distant third with seven.