At a time when the global supply chain is under immense pressure due to unrest, corruption and the impact of the pandemic, food security and integrity are at the centre of government strategies in the fight against ending malnutrition for all.
While food fortification programmes (which involves the adding of necessary vitamins and micronutrients to staple foods) and regulations have been undertaken and introduced across the continent, many regions have still fallen short of meeting these regulations and ensuring access to adequately fortified foods to consumers – particularly those in underserved communities.
In helping industries at large to pivot and maintain relevance, technologies such as the Cloud and Artificial Intelligence (AI) have also transformed the agricultural industry. However, now – in a world first – the use of AI and machine learning is transforming food testing and ensuring food integrity through Millhouse International’s new innovative solution called DetectX.
In what will ensure that the food testing process is able to be fully audited, DetectX makes use of machine learning to regularly test for the presence of micronutrients in foods – more particularly, the platform identifies Palmitate (Vitamin A) added to staple foods such as sugar, which is in many cases a mandatory requirement in developing countries to help negate malnutrition.
Traditionally, adequate infrastructure has not existed on the continent to thoroughly test if foods are fortified correctly. This often leads to challenges that include time delays, high costs and inefficiencies – ultimately leaving manufacturers with no choice but to rely on ineffectual paper trails rather than verified product integrity. This can lead to potentially disastrous results for the end-consumers who entrust manufacturers and retailers with their nutritional wellbeing.
“With DetectX, the industry can provide qualitative results and assume quantitative results using machine learning techniques paired with aggregated past data. Using DetectX requires minimal training and can be done at very low costs per test. Small and big millers alike will be able to police the presence of and then assume the quantity of micronutrients present in produce. Once samples are flagged as ‘inadequate’ they can then send samples to laboratories to comprehensively confirm suspicions,” says Andre Redinger, Founder of Millhouse International.
Stunting, wasting and obesity rates are at an all time high across Africa. While these issues are a product of the lack of nutrition, all of them can be solved through correct food fortification. For the first time, the entire value chain will be able to be audited: from raw ingredients, to the refining process, to packaging and fortification, and all the way to retailers and consumers.
“DetectX will ensure that regulations set by governments are met, that costs remain low, that the testing process is air-tight and streamlined, and that the food basket is adequately fortified. The wonder of technology has done so much for other industries – now it is agriculture’s turn!,” concludes Redinger.
