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An incident investigation course is conducted in Kigali, Rwanda.
Three decades ago, KLM offered some aviation safety support to the Tanzanian government. That gesture ultimately sparked the creation of an independent foundation, which has become a well-respected advocate for African aviation safety.
“AviAssist started in 1995, before there were ICAO audits, before there were IATA IOSA [audit] programs,” AviAssist Foundation director Tom Kok told ATW.
Back then, IATA had raised concerns about Tanzania’s safety standards, so KLM—wanting to maintain its own Tanzanian operations—stepped in to help. This led to the creation of AviAssist, a joint venture between KLM and the Dutch government, in close cooperation with the Flight Safety Foundation. AviAssist became an independent nonprofit organization in 2008, shifting its focus from KLM’s African destinations to improving aviation safety across the whole continent.
“Africa is not an afterthought; it’s the only market we serve,” Kok said. “The initial qualification of people is really good, but they qualify too few people and there is too little continuous professional development. That makes it very difficult for people to stay updated on the latest topics.”
Meanwhile, larger operators, like Ethiopian Airlines and Kenya Airways, need most of their training capacity to support their own growth. The situation is further compounded by the generous daily travel allowances often given to civil servants, incentivizing them to train abroad rather than building up local resources. AviAssist’s mission is to improve African safety by training people locally.
In November 2020, AviAssist opened its first Safety Promotion Center at the University of Rwanda, employing graduates in its offices.
“Over the next decade, we are planning to develop a similar center in western Africa, and another one in southern Africa,” Kok said. “One thing that’s really lacking is there’s no [local] safety research. By starting to work with African universities, that will really help drive policy choices based on local research, as opposed to data that we get from elsewhere in the world.”
Kok firmly believes that Africans will feel greater ownership of safety interventions if they are based on research performed in Africa.
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