The Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA) was one of the first to examine regulations and policies in 79 countries [13]. CTA, an organization seeking to advance food security and inclusive economic growth in poor nations, found that in 2016, 77% of African and 39% of Caribbean countries did not have any specific rules for drone use. In the same year, Ravich (2016) found that although drone laws varied among nations, the common unifying concerns were safety, privacy, and national security [14]. One year later, the RAND Corporation published a report that summarized commercial drone regulations worldwide [15]. RAND found that the level of regulation restrictiveness reflected whether the nation favored safety over promoting recent technology. The same year, Cracknell (2017) found a trend of requiring the pilot to complete a training program and keeping a log of all flights [16]. Tsiamis et al. (2019) compared drone regulations across 35 countries of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and found that, although there were many variations in legal framework, common considerations were the vehicle size and weight, flight altitude, and purpose of use [17]. That same year, Coops et al. (2019) found that one-quarter of countries had strict laws regulating drone use, one-third lacked regulations, and six countries simply banned drones [18]. A recent analysis found there was no central European repository for data related to remote pilots, legal entities, and operational approvals that could help with monitoring and enforcement [19].

Ayamga et al. (2021) found that the lack of skilled personnel, processes, and resources were the main factors hindering the implementation and enforcement of drone regulations in Africa [20]. Sah et al. (2021) assessed that threats to privacy and security were critical barriers to implementing drone regulations in the logistics sector [21]. Tran et al. (2022) compared regulatory considerations across the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, China, Singapore, Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam and discovered that rules varied in their requirements for flight permits, pilot qualifications, and operating constraints such as maintaining visual line-of-sight, altitude limits, flying at night, and proximity to airfields [22]. More generally, some in developing nations fear that technological advancements will lower worker wages [23].

A literature review by Chauhan (2019) found that publications from 1968 to 2017 about drone utility increased at a rate of 16% annually [24]. In 2015, Oxford Analytica suggested that a push to commercialize drones will help to advance drone regulations and that a comprehensive regulatory framework will accelerate applications [25]. Kitonsa et al. (2018) suggested that drone technology can help to achieve the United Nations’ sustainable development goals in matters such as addressing issues in agriculture, e-commerce, and healthcare [7]. Schulzke (2019) pointed out that drone technology advancements for civilian applications could also increase their attractiveness for military use [26]. Calandrillo et al. (2020) criticized the slow pace of U.S. regulations for stalling drone applications and forcing innovation efforts to move abroad [27].

Research suggests that AAM will complement various forms of ground transportation such as autonomous vehicles and ridesharing [28]. Drones can replace long portions of ground trips to help reduce congestion and pollution [29]. For example, the Uber Elevate use case suggests that riders can book complete door-to-door trips by taking ground ride share to vertiports where drones will more quickly complete the long-haul portion of a regional trip [30]. That is, passenger drones can take more direct air routes between cities to provide immense time savings under affordable conditions [31]. Similarly, cargo drones can bypass ground traffic to speed up package delivery in both middle-mile and last-mile operations [32].