Lazaro Johanna Mangewa has been employed as an Assistant Lecturer in wildlife management at Sokoine University of Agriculture (SUA), Tanzania from 2014 to the present. He is currently pursuing his Ph.D. in Life Sciences (Biodiversity and Ecosystem Management) at the Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology, Tanzania after recovering from fractures (2009) and re-fracture (2016) of a left femur following a serious road accident injury. He is one of the main researchers in this project scaling up UAV technology from the northern to southern hemisphere, particularly to large and complex heterogenous wildlife conservation areas in Tanzania. He earned an MSc in Natural Resources Assessment and Management at the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania in 2007 and a BSc in wildlife management at SUA in 2002. He completed a Drones Pilot Training course in 2021 provided by the ProWings Africa of South Africa in collaboration with the Tanzania Civil Aviation Training College. His professional areas include Wildlife habitat assessment and monitoring; assessment of land use/cover, wildlife management areas in Tanzania; and assessment of alien invasive plant species. His current professional interests include the use of UAVs in ecological surveys. His memberships to professional bodies include The East African Environmental Impact Assessment Association (2005–present) and The Wildlife Conservation Society of Tanzania (2003–present).

Prof. Patrick Alois Ndakidemi is a plant and soil expert. He has been employed in the School of Life Sciences and Bioengineering at The Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology since April 2011. He received his bachelor’s degree in agriculture at the Sokoine University of Agriculture in 1987, Post Graduate Diploma in Soil Science at the Agriculture University of Norway in 1990, a master’s degree in agriculture at the Sokoine University of Agriculture in 1992, and a Ph.D. degree at Cape Peninsula University in 2006. His research interests focus on understanding the adaptation and physiological mechanisms of plants growing in highly intensified cropping systems in nutrient-poor soils of bananas, cereals, legumes, and other crops in the ecosystem. He has published an adequate number of articles ranging from agronomy and agroecological aspects. Currently, he has expanded his areas of interest and works on the use of Unmanned Aerial Surveys in agroecology and landscapes with human activities and wildlife habitats. His main research areas include food crop adaptation to nutrient-poor soils and climate change; ecological physiology of food crops; economic use of legumes in agricultural and natural eco-systems; promoting biological N2 fixation in agricultural systems; physiology of plants and microorganisms exposed to environmental pollution; and allelopathic effects of weeds on other plant species. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5218-242X.

Dr. Richard D. Alward has been a Senior Ecologist at the Aridlands, LLC Grand Junction in the United States of America since 2017.  He was a research partner at the Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology in Tanzania from 2019 to 2021. He has been a Certified Senior Ecologist recognized by the Ecological Society of America since 2015. He has been a Certified UAS Remote Pilot recognized by the Federal Aviation Administration since 2016 with the Credential ID No. 3914628. He worked as a visiting research Professor at Colorado Mesa University, USA from 2016 to 2022. He earned his PhD in Ecology at Colorado State University, USA in 1999. He received his Master of Science in Biological Sciences (1992) and Bachelor of Science in Life Sciences (1984) at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in the USA. His interest areas include integrating technology and ecology such as drone-mounted sensors into natural resource assessment, restoration ecology, natural resource Policy, and responsible resource development, promoting adaptive management approaches for wildlife habitats. His honors and awards associated with Colorado State University are as follows: Phi Kappa Phi, issued by The Phi Kappa Phi Honour Society (1999), and the Antarctica Service Medal issued by the National Science Foundation (1999). His memberships include the Society for Ecological Restoration (2012–present); and the Ecological Society of America (1991–present).

Dr. Hamza Khalid Kija is a Senior Research Officer (GIS and Remote Sensing) at the Tanzania Wildlife Research Institute (TAWIRI). He is a wildlife researcher and environmental management professional with over 18 years of experience. He received his Ph.D. in Wildlife Management from Sokoine University of Agriculture (SUA), Tanzania (2021). His research focused on understanding the intricate relationships between wildlife populations, land use, and land cover dynamics. He obtained an MSc. in Geoinformation Science for Earth Observation and Natural Resources from the Faculty of Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation (ITC) of the University of Twente in the Netherlands (2009). He obtained a B.Sc. in Wildlife Management from SUA (2003). Key professional areas of interest include landscape ecology, land use and land cover (LULC), protected area development, assessment of community wildlife management areas, wildlife corridors, and habitat suitability for wildlife. He has authored or co-authored a total of 29 publications. He is an active member of the research community.

Emmanuel Richard Nasolwa is the Operations Manager at the Specialist Drone Services (T) Ltd on Precision Agriculture (2023 – Present). He is studying aerial applications (spraying and spreading Systems) and undertaking a topographical survey. He obtained his Bachelor’s Degree in Agronomy at Sokoine University of Agriculture (SUA) in Tanzania (2018). Also, he has a Certificate of Drone Technology and Entrepreneurship from the African Drone and Data Academy (ADDA), Malawi (2020). His main skills that were strengthened by this training include UAV operations (hybrid, fixed wing, and quadcopter) for data collection, drone data analysis, building drones, and related safety management. His main professional areas of interest include land husbandry and conservation agriculture, agriculture land use planning and management, environmental pollution and management of agriculture wastes, application to GIS and remote sensing, management of dry lands, soil fertility and land productivity, weed management, and the use of UAV-technology in precision agriculture and environmental management projects. He also acquired UAV use experience from the TOA Custodian Nigeria Limited as a Drone Flight Operator (Jan to Dec 2022) and the sandwich project via The International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) from a PhD researcher at KU Leuven University in Belgium and the Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology (NM-AIST) in Tanzania (2018–2021) on banana husbandry.

Prof. Linus Kassiani Munishi is an Associate Professor in Landscape and Conservation Ecology within the School of Life Sciences and Bioengineering at The Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology, Arusha, Tanzania. He received his Bachelor’s degree in wildlife management at Sokoine University of Agriculture (SUA) in 2002, a Master’s degree in Natural Resource Management at SUA in 2004, and a Ph.D. degree at the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, South Africa and University of Washington, USA in 2011. He has conducted research studies in many countries including South Africa, the UK, USA, Australia, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Tanzania. His major research areas of interest include landscape ecology, restoration ecology, applied ecology, climate change, and natural resources assessment. He has served as a reviewer and co-editor in many journals hosted by Elsevier and Wiley Publishers. Currently, he has developed nature-based solutions for managing invasive species in critical ecosystems such as in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area in Tanzania. He has started conducting research works using unmanned aerial surveys (drones). He has a professional membership to the Society for Conservation Biology, Washington D.C., USA (2007–present) and UK Research and Innovation, Swindon (2017–present).