Our Supply Chain Leadership Across Africa series continues in earnest with a fascinating discussion around the proposition of using drone technology for social good. In this episode, hosts Scott Luton welcomes Prashant Yadav to the show, a globally recognized expert in healthcare supply chains and affiliate professor at global business school INSEAD, where he leads the Africa Initiative. Prashant is something of a media virtuoso, having appeared in prominent publications such as The Economist and Financial Times to share his expertise. Sitting alongside Prashant is Olivier Defawe of VillageReach, a global nonprofit that transforms healthcare delivery to reach everyone by working with partners to build responsive primary healthcare systems that deliver health products and services to the most under-reached. A key priority for both guests centers around realizing the immense potential for drones to unlock healthcare access, supply chain optimization, and socioeconomic development across the African continent. During the discussion, they touch on a number of pertinent questions: What are the major challenges to scaling and sustaining drone transport operations in Africa? How can we ultimately ensure drone transport is more cost-effective for public health supply chains? What can stakeholders do on the supply and demand side to increase adoption…

How are innovations helping to transform public health supply chains? How are technology providers and analytics specialists working with the health sector to bring cutting-edge capabilities so each person has the health care needed to thrive? During this episode of Supply Chain Now’s Supply Chain Leadership Across Africa series we talk with two people who talk about the importance of innovation for public health supply chains – and what it takes to make innovations sustainable in Africa. Director of VillageReach’s Global Technical Team and experienced health supply chain expert Tapiwa Mukwashi is our first guest. On a day-to-day basis, Tapiwa ensures VillageReach’s various teams across Africa have the technical assistance they need to do their jobs, working closely with vendors such as data analytics company Kapsule to do just that. David Chen, Kapsule’s Co-CEO and Co-Founder, also joins us to explain how his innovation came to market and some of the challenges, successes and lessons learned he has collected along the way. During the conversation, the duo highlight the progress made but emphasize the need for more mature modeling and professionalization of the supply chain to better underpin African health care networks. Here, the importance of skills, infrastructure and technology…