Africa’s revised Abuja Safety Targets are moving beyond broad continental commitments into a more structured implementation phase, backed by a 330-page action plan, national facilitators and a live monitoring system designed to show where progress is being made and where states continue to fall behind.
Africa’s aviation safety performance has improved considerably since the original Abuja Safety Targets were conceived in 2012, but the continental picture remains uneven. Strong results in several states sit alongside very low effective implementation scores elsewhere, while weaknesses in accident investigation, surveillance, the resolution of safety findings and access to qualified technical personnel continue to weigh heavily on the region’s overall performance.
That imbalance now sits at the centre of a revised approach to the Abuja Safety Targets, which is intended to make implementation easier to follow, more measurable and more accountable.
Presenting the latest position during the 3rd AFRAA Safety and Operations Summit, Henry Okech, Director of Safety and Technical Services at the African Civil Aviation Commission, set out how the targets have evolved from a relatively simple set of continental ambitions into a detailed framework aligned with ICAO’s six global safety goals.
The revised approach combines the targets themselves with a comprehensive action plan, clearly assigned responsibilities, implementation timelines, estimated resource requirements and a new real-time monitoring and reporting platform.
For AFCAC, the change is intended to address one of the weaknesses that has persisted since the first targets were introduced: the gap between setting continental objectives and being able to see, in practical terms, whether individual states are implementing them.
Africa’s Average Effective Implementation Score Stands at 62.2%
Across the 54 African states that are contracting parties to the Chicago Convention, the average Effective Implementation score currently stands at 62.2%. This remains below the global target of 75%.
Recent oversight activity has nevertheless produced strong results in several states. Côte d’Ivoire recorded an Effective Implementation score of 93.78%, South Africa achieved a preliminary score of 95.12% following a recent ICAO Coordinated Validation Mission, and Nigeria recorded 91.4%.
These individual improvements are significant, but their impact on the continental average remains limited because of the wide gap between the strongest and weakest-performing states. Some African states remain below 50% in terms of Effective Implementation, leaving the overall continental picture heavily influenced by large disparities in regulatory and oversight capability.
The results also show that Africa’s principal weakness is not necessarily the absence of legislation or basic regulatory structures.
Among ICAO’s eight Critical Elements (CE) of a state safety oversight system, the continent performs strongest in primary aviation legislation, which stands at 76.7%, followed by specific operating regulations at 75.1%.
The position deteriorates as the system moves from establishing regulatory frameworks towards implementing, supervising and enforcing them.
Technical personnel qualification and training stands at 59.4%. Certification, licensing, authorisations and approvals record 61.7%, while surveillance performance is considerably lower at 48%.
The weakest critical element is the resolution of safety issues, at 37.7%.
| Critical Element | Description |
| CE1 | Primary aviation legislation, including the national Civil Aviation Act |
| CE2 | Specific operating regulations |
| CE3 | Establishment of the Civil Aviation Authority and its systems |
| CE4 | Technical personnel qualifications and training |
| CE5 | Technical guidance, tools and the information inspectors need to carry out oversight responsibilities |
| CE6 | Certification, licensing, authorisations and approvals |
| CE7 | Surveillance, including inspections and audits after operators and service providers have been licensed, authorised or approved |
| CE8 | Resolution of safety issues arising from findings and observations identified through audits, inspections and surveillance |
These figures point to a persistent implementation problem. States may have legislation, regulations and formal institutions in place, but the ability to maintain sufficient qualified personnel, conduct effective surveillance and close findings arising from audits, inspections and oversight activity remains considerably weaker.
The consequences extend beyond the regulator itself. Insufficiently trained and qualified oversight personnel can affect the quality of technical guidance available to operators and service providers, while limitations in certification and surveillance capability can weaken the wider safety system.
Across the main audit areas, Aircraft Accident and Incident Investigation is the lowest-performing area on the continent, with a score of 49.6%.
Taken together, these results show why Africa’s safety challenge cannot be assessed through legislation or headline audit results alone. The more difficult weaknesses lie in the operational parts of the oversight system, particularly the personnel, surveillance and follow-up mechanisms needed to ensure requirements are implemented consistently.
A Changing Pattern of Significant Safety Concerns
Significant Safety Concerns were among the deficiencies that helped drive the creation of the original Abuja Safety Targets.
Earlier concerns were largely associated with air operator certification processes. Coordinated intervention by AFCAC, AFRAA, ICAO, IATA and other stakeholders helped reduce many of those issues, but the pattern has since changed.
A new group of Significant Safety Concerns has emerged within air navigation services.
Three current concerns in Africa are associated with flight procedure design and validation, together with the calibration of flight equipment.
The shift is important because it shows that aviation safety priorities do not remain static. Progress in one area does not remove the need to identify new weaknesses elsewhere, particularly as the aviation system becomes more complex and greater attention is directed towards air navigation services, infrastructure and technical capability.
The accident picture has also improved since 2012, with the rate of reportable accidents per million departures declining significantly. AFCAC nevertheless cautions against interpreting that improvement as a reason for complacency.
Official accident statistics are shaped by ICAO reporting thresholds and the categories of aircraft covered by those requirements. Activity outside those thresholds, including some private operations, may not be fully reflected in the reported data even though accidents continue to occur.
For the revised Abuja Safety Targets, the challenge is no longer simply to reduce the number of accidents recorded in official statistics. It is to strengthen the systems that identify weaknesses earlier, improve oversight performance and ensure that states are able to demonstrate sustained progress.
From Broad Targets to an Implementation Framework
When the Abuja Safety Targets were first developed in 2012, they were relatively straightforward.
They set out what the continent wanted to achieve, but did not provide the level of detail needed to show precisely what implementation required, which organisations were responsible, how progress would be measured or what resources would be necessary.
The 2017 revision added air navigation services targets, but the wider framework still lacked much of the operational detail needed for consistent implementation.
The most recent revision, undertaken during 2022 and 2023 with support from ICAO, the African Union Commission, AFRAA, IATA, regional safety organisations and other stakeholders, was designed to address those limitations.
Each revised target has now been aligned with the ICAO Global Aviation Safety Goals and relevant regional planning frameworks.
The framework identifies key performance indicators, known implementation challenges and mitigation measures that can be used to overcome them. It also sets out the actions required, the stakeholders involved and the resources that may be needed before implementation begins.
This represents a significant change in approach.
Rather than treating the Abuja Safety Targets as a continental list against which states periodically report progress, the revised framework is intended to give each state a clearer path from a target to the practical work required to achieve it.
A 330-Page Action Plan Sets Out the Work Required
Once ministers had approved and endorsed the revised targets, the next challenge was to define how they would be implemented.
That work resulted in a 330-page action plan ( https://www.afcac.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/Revised-ASTs-Action-Plan.pdf) developed through meetings and workshops involving technical experts and subsequently presented to the AFI Plan Steering Committee for approval and endorsement.
The action plan provides a detailed implementation structure for the revised targets.
For each action, it identifies specific tasks, responsible entities, supporting organisations, expected timelines and estimated budgets. The cost estimates are intended as guidance, recognising that requirements will vary between states.
The plan is structured so that an individual state can begin with the targets it is best prepared to address, while continuing towards implementation across the full framework.
A target can also be treated as a distinct project.
An organisation may choose to support a particular target within a specific state, while several organisations can work together where broader technical or financial intervention is required.
That approach opens the implementation process to a wider group of partners. Member states remain the central point of delivery, but ICAO, AFCAC, regional safety oversight organisations, regional accident investigation organisations, AFRAA, aviation training organisations and other stakeholders all have roles within the wider system.
The action plan also covers the detailed work required to address specific deficiencies, including runway excursions, runway safety teams and other operational risks raised during the summit.
Monitoring Is Moving from Questionnaires to Real-Time Reporting
For many years, monitoring progress against the Abuja Safety Targets relied on conventional questionnaires submitted by states.
The process was slow and dependent on individual states providing information at their own pace. Delayed responses affected AFCAC’s ability to compile an accurate and current continental picture.
A new real-time monitoring and reporting tool has now been introduced to change that.
The platform allows states to establish national teams and committees involving relevant government, regulatory and industry participants. Once implementation activities have been completed, evidence consolidated and progress validated at national level, the information can be submitted through the system.
The dashboard is available in English, French, Portuguese and Arabic.
AFCAC can monitor state activity as it happens.
Where a state records full implementation of a target, the supporting evidence can be reviewed to understand how that result was achieved. Successful approaches can then be shared with other states as examples of good practice.
The platform also makes inactivity visible.
A state that goes for an extended period without updating its information can be identified and approached to establish why progress has stalled and what support may be required.
This represents one of the most important changes in the revised system. Implementation is no longer intended to depend on infrequent continental reports assembled long after the work has taken place.
AFCAC wants visibility of progress while implementation is happening.
National Facilitators Now Coordinate Implementation
To support the new reporting structure, each member state has been asked to nominate two Revised Abuja Safety Targets National Facilitators.
The facilitators are responsible for coordinating implementation with the relevant stakeholders in their state, reporting developments, identifying challenges and raising requests for support.
They also serve as the authorised users responsible for submitting validated information through the monitoring system.
The facilitators have been trained on the revised targets, the action plan and the dashboard, including practical instruction in how to use the system.
The monitoring platform went live on 8 May, with the information now appearing on the dashboard being supplied by the national facilitators.
Their role is not to enter unverified information independently.
Updates are expected to reflect work that has already been processed and validated within the state, with the relevant regulatory, government and industry participants involved before information is uploaded.
The national facilitators are intended to create a direct link between implementation at state level and continental oversight through AFCAC.
Accountability Is Moving Closer to the State Level
AFCAC is required to report every two years to African ministers on the status of implementation across member states, the challenges encountered and the support being provided.
Under the revised framework, the information available to ministers should become more detailed and current.
Implementation results and unresolved challenges will continue to move through continental reporting structures to the African Union level, but the new system is intended to make individual state performance more visible.
Each state will be expected to account for its progress.
That accountability is reinforced by the structure of the action plan, which defines what needs to be done, which entities are responsible and the timeframes attached to the work.
The revised process also makes it easier to identify where a problem is not technical but financial.
Funding Remains a Major Constraint
Some states do not have the financial resources needed to address all of the requirements contained in the revised targets.
The cost of resolving Significant Safety Concerns can itself be a major obstacle, while infrastructure-related targets may require substantial capital investment.
AFCAC is consequently calling on industry organisations, international partners and other stakeholders to identify where they can provide support.
That assistance may take the form of funding, technical expertise or support for a specific target within an individual state.
The detailed structure of the action plan is intended to make such intervention more targeted. Rather than offering broad support without a defined implementation pathway, a partner can identify a specific state, target, task or resource gap.
The model is built around the idea that improving Africa’s safety performance will require more than national regulators working independently.
ICAO, IATA, AFRAA, manufacturers, aviation training organisations and other industry participants are expected to contribute to the wider implementation effort.
The New System Also Addresses the Delay Between ICAO Audits
A further weakness in the existing safety oversight picture is the amount of time that can pass between ICAO activities.
Continuous Monitoring Approach activities and Coordinated Validation Missions may take place several years apart. In some states, more than five years can pass before an Effective Implementation score changes.
By the time a new audit or validation mission reflects improved performance, extensive work may already have taken place.
AFCAC wants the real-time Abuja Safety Targets system to provide a more immediate view of that progress.
If states update the system consistently and provide the necessary supporting evidence, the continent should be able to see improvements long before the next ICAO audit or validation mission.
That information could also help states prepare more effectively for future ICAO activity.
Progress recorded against the revised Abuja Safety Targets can provide a body of evidence showing what has been implemented, what remains incomplete and where further action is required.
The Next Phase Will Depend on Implementation
Africa’s revised safety framework is now considerably more detailed than the original targets introduced in 2012.
The targets have been aligned with global and regional plans, implementation requirements have been expanded, responsibilities have been assigned, a detailed action plan is in place, national facilitators have been trained and a real-time monitoring platform is operational.
None of those measures will improve safety on their own.
The value of the revised approach will depend on whether states use the framework consistently, whether national stakeholders cooperate, whether progress is supported by evidence and whether technical and financial assistance reaches the states and targets that need it most.
Africa’s current 62.2% average Effective Implementation score shows how much work remains.
The strongest-performing states are demonstrating that high oversight scores can be achieved on the continent, but the wide gap between them and states performing below 50% remains one of the central challenges facing African aviation safety.
The next measure of success will not be the publication of another target or plan. It will be whether the new system produces measurable improvement in the weak areas already identified, from technical personnel and surveillance to accident investigation, safety issue resolution and air navigation services.
