The HOPE Consortium and Astral Aviation Sign MoU to enhance Vaccine Distribution Solutions to Africa

23 Sep The HOPE Consortium and Astral Aviation Sign MoU to enhance Vaccine Distribution Solutions to Africa

The HOPE Consortium and Astral Aviation Sign MoU to enhance Vaccine Distribution Solutions to Africa
The two entities have formed a strategic partnership with the aim of accelerating vaccine distribution to the African nations
Abu Dhabi, UAE – XX XX, 2021: As part of its continued commitment to vaccine distribution in Africa, the HOPE Consortium has partnered with Kenya-based Astral Aviation to offer vaccine distribution solutions in Africa .This highlights HOPE Consortium’s efforts in reinforcing partnerships that aim towards fighting the global COVID-19 pandemic, as well as fulfilling HOPE Consortium’s mission as a global logistics facilitator for vaccines delivery.
As part of the partnership agreement, both entities will focus on intra-African cooperation to enhance vaccine distribution within the African continent. The HOPE Consortium will utilise Astral Aviation’s comprehensive network, technologies, and market expertise, to support its global objective of facilitating vaccine availability with special emphasis on the African continent.
The partnership will ensure timely and secure delivery of vaccines and critical supplies to all 54 African nations. Astral Aviation operates a diverse fleet of 14 freighter aircrafts and provides innovative, flexible, and cost-effective UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) and UAS (Unmanned Aerial Systems) integrated drone-based solutions, as well as warehousing solutions to both store and deliver vaccines to remote locales.
Through this partnership, the HOPE Consortium aims to facilitate the end-to-end supply chains required to distribute vaccines from their base in Abu Dhabi to all African countries. The HOPE Consortium has geared its operations to delivering millions of critical COVID-19 vaccines to any country in need and thus far has handled 65 million doses across 40 countries.
Commenting on the partnership, Mr. Sanjeev Gadhia, CEO of Astral Aviation said: “We are truly honoured to partner with the HOPE Consortium and participate in the critical distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, based on our track-record in performing humanitarian initiatives and vaccine flights within Africa. Astral will add further to the necessary technological, and warehousing solutions for the COVID-19 vaccines from the hub in Abu Dhabi to all the 54 Countries in Africa directly or via its Nairobi Hub, which occupies 9000 m2 of cold-storage facilities.”
It is worth mentioning that Astral has been selected by UNICEF to perform vaccine flights for COVAX and by the African Medical Supplies Platform to perform vaccine flights for the African Union. This synergetic partnership with the HOPE Consortium will see Astral provide capacity for vaccines on its scheduled and charter freighter network in addition to world-class drone solutions and systems to Africa with the purpose of facilitating immunisation programmes.
Robert Sutton, Head of Logistics Cluster, Abu Dhabi Ports, said: “Africa has always been a high priority market for the HOPE Consortium, and to that end, we are pleased to join hands with Astral Aviation. Their expertise provides a new dimension towards our overarching objectives with a track record of over 20 years of experience in operating within Africa.”
“This partnership reinforces the HOPE Consortium aims to create a sustainable ecosystem based on our collective global networks, logistics and supply chain capabilities in order to facilitate vaccine distribution across the globe. Our partnership with Astral Aviation is another benchmark towards our commitment to targeting every country, region, and locale. We are confident that this partnership will help to enhance the HOPE Consortium’s efforts in Africa and ensure that no one is left behind in the quest against the pandemic.”