It is an African victory that resonates well beyond the borders of Tanzania and Ivory Coast. In July 2024, the Japan Space Agency (JAXA) and the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) announced the winners of the 8th round of the KiboCUBE program. Among those selected, a joint team formed from the Dar es Salaam Institute of Technology (DIT) in Tanzania and the Félix Houphouët-Boigny National Polytechnic Institute (INP-HB) in Ivory Coast.

A CubeSat with well-defined missions

The nanosatellite called TanSat-1 is a 1U CubeSat, with compact dimensions of 10 cm x 10 cm x 11.35 cm, for a maximum weight of 1.3 kg. Despite its small size, its ambitions are big. It is designed to collect data via the Internet of Things (IoT), relay information and transfer images from orbit. More concretely, TanSat-1 will follow GPS beacons installed in wildlife reserves and collect environmental data using specialized sensors, thus contributing to the conservation of biodiversity and the fight against climate change.

Pioneering South-South cooperation

The deployment will take place from the Japanese experimental module “Kibo” aboard the International Space Station (ISS), as part of the UN/Japan cooperation program for the deployment of CubeSats. This collaboration between two African countries marks the first time that Tanzania and Ivory Coast will deploy a satellite in space. For INP-HB, an engineering school based in Yamoussoukro, it is the consecration of a national space strategy which is intensifying, in particular with a recent partnership with the University of Montpellier for former Ivorian specialists.

TanSat-1 illustrates a growing continental dynamic. From Senegal, with its Gaindesat nanosatellite, to South Africa, now passing through Tanzania and the Ivory Coast, the continent is gradually establishing itself as an emerging player in the conquest of space. For these African engineers, space is no longer a distant destination, it is a concrete development tool.