SafeBite ZA is a hyper-localized AI platform designed to reduce foodborne illnesses in South Africa, particularly in Cape Town's informal communities. By leveraging AI-powered food contamination detection, real-time community reporting, and multilingual food safety education, SafeBite ZA empowers individuals to make safer food choices.
In South Africa, 1 in 4 people suffer from foodborne illnesses annually due to improper food handling, contaminated water, and lack of food safety education. Communities with limited resources and weak healthcare access are disproportionately affected, with vulnerable populations (e.g., HIV-positive individuals) being at higher risk. The 2017 Listeria outbreak, which claimed over 200 lives, underscores the urgent need for a solution.
- Uses smartphone cameras & low-cost IoT sensors to scan food for contaminants like Listeria and E. coli.
- AI image analysis detects spoilage in South African foods (e.g., biltong, boerewors, amasi).
- Simulated odor detection helps assess food quality.
- Users report unsafe vendors or contaminated food in local shops.
- Real-time heatmaps alert authorities to high-risk areas (e.g., Khayelitsha, Mitchells Plain).
- AI-generated food safety tips in isiXhosa, Afrikaans, and English.
- Gamified quizzes teach proper food storage and hygiene practices.
Designed for accessibility, our app features:
- Intuitive scanning & reporting system
- Easy-to-understand AI explanations
- Gamified learning experience
- Computer Vision: Azure Custom Vision trained on 50,000+ South African food images for spoilage detection.
- Predictive Analytics: Azure Machine Learning forecasts contamination risks based on local environmental data.
- Azure AI Services:
- AI Search: Provides descriptions of how fresh food should look, smell, taste, and feel.
- AI Translator: Translates app dialogues into multiple languages for accessibility.
SafeBite ZA aims to:
✅ Reduce foodborne illnesses through early detection and prevention.
✅ Educate users on safe food handling and hygiene.
✅ Improve access to fresh food by integrating with local supermarkets.
✅ Empower communities to report and mitigate unsafe food practices.
- Bias Mitigation: Trained on diverse South African foods (e.g., morogo, bobotie).
- Transparency: Explainable AI dashboards in collaboration with the South African Bureau of Standards (SABS).
- Legal Compliance: Adheres to South Africa’s POPIA (Protection of Personal Information Act).
- Human Oversight: Ensures AI recommendations are verified by human experts.
- Federated Learning: Keeps user data on-device for privacy.
- Metadata Scrubbing: Removes location data from food photos.
- User Consent: Full transparency on data usage with opt-out options.
- AI-Powered Threat Detection: Real-time security monitoring for potential cyber threats.
- Abubakr Valentine – valentinemay445@gmail.com
- Muneeb Lewis – mrlewis0182@gmail.com
- Tristan Hendricks – tristanhendricks19@gmail.com
- Wayden Harker – waydenryan26@gmail.com