From The Gambia To The Galaxy: The African Entrepreneur At The Start Of Her Space Odyssey

An astronaut in the making, Fama Jallow is living proof that Africans have a future in space.

Hailing from The Gambia, a small West African nation nestled within the borders of Senegal, the 28-year-old is an astronaut candidate with Titans Space Industries, training toward a spaceflight qualification by 2029.

The mission? To establish a space task force dedicated to scientific research.

“What I’m most excited about is being an African in that program. For me, it’s important to not only leave a legacy, but to also build systems that young Africans can be part of,” Jallow tells FORBES AFRICA, her smile as wide as can be.

When something is as uncharted as space, it takes trailblazers to inspire the next generation. It can shift perceptions in an instant: if a woman from The Gambia, the smallest country on mainland Africa, can do it, why can’t one from Zimbabwe? Or Botswana, Angola, or Ghana?

While the enigma of space captivated her from a young age, it took a celestial-loving high school teacher named Space (and that is not a typo), to show Jallow that the galaxies were not out of reach.

“You just need one person to cultivate an idea within you,” she says, before emphasizing the importance of young Africans being able to “see themselves in the industry”.

After earning a university scholarship through the China Scholarship Council, Jallow found herself on a plane to Nanjing, China, a historic city with more than triple The Gambia’s 2.8 million population. She returned home fluent in Mandarin and with a degree in aerospace engineering.

Inevitably, a master’s degree followed, this time taking her to the southern tip of Africa, to Stellenbosch University in South Africa, where she graduated in 2023 as a Mandela Rhodes Foundation Scholar.

Now ready to make her mark, she became The Gambia’s first female drone pilot, before co-founding HISIA, a climate intelligence firm revolutionizing rural agriculture in Africa.

By connecting smallholder farmers in rural areas—through SMS—to satellite data, and environmental sensors, HISIA provides local insights, soil analyses, and early warnings of extreme weather to improve food security by establishing resilience against climate risks.

“It’s important for Africans to view space not just as something that , but as something that can be woven into our infrastructure to help solve the problems we currently face,” says Jallow.

As space becomes increasingly data-driven, she’s cautious of an underlying threat: if Africa doesn’t deploy its own satellites swiftly, foreign dependence could reach new heights.

The continent’s complexities, encompassing thousands of languages, and diverse cultures and religions, require localized monitoring. A one-size-fits-all approach seemingly won’t work.

Relying on international data to create African-centric frameworks is as mismatched as a Canadian telling an Ethiopian how to grow coffee.

“Data is the new goal,” Jallow adds. “Africa needs to establish data sovereignty by collecting and processing its own data, because who controls your data also controls your future.”

She may be at the start of her space odyssey, but Jallow possesses an aura that suggests Africa is in good hands, both on Earth and among the stars.