The Possible Beneficial Effect of Using Small Satellite Technology to Promote the Achievement of the UN Sustainable Development Goal of Poverty Reduction Specifically on the African Continent

Abstract

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals are hard to achieve, especially so for African states. However, the African continent is brimming with potential given its arable land, vast mineral deposits, and demographic dividend in the form of a generally young population. The current developmental status of the continent, while lagging in comparison with many other developing continents and regions, presents an opportunity to implement the most advanced and contemporary technologies for developmental purposes due to the lack of legacy technologies that need to be replaced. This study explores the proposition by investigating the possible achievement of the United Nations Sustainable Goal 1, namely the eradication of poverty, by making use of small satellites within swarm configurations. The investigation is performed by making use of systems theory and reframes the question by investigating the possible effect that the techno-sphere dimension of small satellite technology could possibly have on the African continent’s poverty problem given the fact that the continent and its constituent parts form a complex system.