Application of drones and other advanced technologi in distribution of provisions during humanitarian crises : A systematic literature review

Unarmed aerial vehicles, also known as drones together with other advanced technology suchas the use of satellite pictures, Artificial intelligence, Radio-frequency identification (RFID),mobile technology and 3D printers can play a critical role in distributing provisions to remoteareas. The aim of this paper was to review the literature regarding using drones and otheradvanced technology during humanitarian crises. Furthermore, the aim was to see howhumanitarian organizations could use this technology to distribute provisions to remote areasand to build a greater understanding of the subject. We employed a systematic literaturereview methodology and defined search strings. Searches were made on Google scholar andOneSearch with 22 different keyword combinations. A total of 24 papers were included in thereview after screening through papers using the keyword combinations. The results indicatethat there are several benefits with using unarmed aerial vehicles and other advancedtechnology to provide provisions to remote areas. The benefits derived from using this typeof technology range from reducing response time during humanitarian crises thus helping tosave more lives, to being environmentally friendly as the carbon dioxide levels are lower thanconventional very by airplanes, trucks and cars. However, several difficulties and downsideswere identified as well. Such as where to station the drones and where to load and unload theprovisions that were provided by the drones