FoodLink

• 

  rough application design

Thwisha and Zoë volunteer in their free time with Thwisha volunteering with Food For Life SA- a Non-Profit Organization working towards alleviating hunger in South Africa. With our combined interests in problem-solving, we identified a few issues. The first is the amount of fresh food from grocery stores or from farmers who sometimes have excess fresh produce going to waste. Recent articles have exposed renowned grocery stores that dispose of food simply because it does not meet the criteria of “aesthetic” to be placed on their shelves. It does not only affect our people but sending a large amount of food -that can be eaten- to landfills produces large amounts of planet-warming gases.

The second issue identified was inefficient communication between food vendors, drivers, and NPO coordinators. A farmer or local grocery stores may have excess fresh produce to donate ( before throwing it away due to expiration) however, they face delayed communication and issues with real-time updates.

The third issue relates to the logistical aspect of matching available donations with drivers or staff members who can drive.

Our vision is to create a platform where farmers and stores that have edible and safe-to-eat food could directly get in touch with NGOs/NPOs. Farmers, stores, and possibly restaurants can choose an NGO/NPO organization based on their availability of drivers, the proximity of the organization, or based on which organization needs their donation most. The chosen non-profit organization would then send drivers to collect said food, track their whereabouts and make use of the food for the less fortunate. To combat issues of theft, there would be additional features such as e-signing on the platform. Information of who picked up the donation, at what time and possibly GPS tracking of the driver with the donation.

Impact and prediction of our project: Effectively reducing food insecurity in South Africa, minimizing waste, the potential of creating job opportunities for delivery/pick up and admin and ultimately contributing to the fight for a greener world.

Built With

• bootstrap
• google-maps
• html
• javascript
• mongodb
• react.js
• vscode
• websockets