An app helps families avoid food waste
CategoriesSustainable News

An app helps families avoid food waste

Spotted: Around 70 per cent of all food waste in the UK comes from households, which equates to around 6.6 million tonnes a year. To help tackle this, Kitche was launched to help families avoid throwing away food. The company has found that the most effective strategies are preventative, so aims to target food waste at the source.  

Kitche has developed an app that lets users import their food to keep track of what they have at home, and users can also scan supermarket receipts to update their virtual inventory. Based on what is recorded on the app, Kitche will send reminders of when foods need to be eaten or frozen, and lets users move products between “To buy”, “At home” and “Ditch” lists. The app also has recipes to help customers use up all their products efficiently.

Since launching three years ago, Kitche has had nearly 65,000 downloads in the UK and earlier this year, the app had a re-launch with new features. For instance, the new Impact Section allows users to see the results of tracking their food waste, including water, CO2, food, and money savings. To make the app even more convenient, Kitche has also made it possible to add food products to the app by voice or scanning by barcode. Other new features include an Explore Section, which includes a lifestyle magazine-style collection of top tips and recipes, and a Community Section where people can connect and become Kitche Ambassadors to earn unique elements both in and outside the app. 

There are so many innovations out there helping to tackle food waste. Springwise has spotted a startup turning wasted fresh produce into healthy snacks and another transforming broccoli waste into plant protein.

Written By: Anam Alam

Reference

An AI-powered mental health and wellness app for families
CategoriesSustainable News

An AI-powered mental health and wellness app for families

Spotted: According to Australian startup togetherAI, over 70 per cent of caregivers struggle to communicate with their children. And over the last three years, the likelihood of young people having a mental health problem has increased by 50 per cent. TogetherAI is helping families to have difficult conversations about mental health and wellbeing with an app that combines wellbeing expertise with artificial intelligence.

The togetherAI app was developed by a team with decades of experience in child psychology, research, and clinical care, and the startup’s wellbeing framework is based on empirical, evidence-based research and insights. Moreover, the company is quick to highlight that its solution is different to parent monitoring platforms which it says destroy communication. Instead, the app hopes to encourage timely conversations that develop positive mental health, build resilience, and keep children safe.

The app is based around several core features. Children create their own ‘digital companion’ that will check how they are feeling, share positivity, play games, and provide lessons on how to understand, manage, and talk about emotions. For parents, the app provides step-by-step conversation guides, as well as real-time insights into how their children are feeling. Based on these insights, the app’s AI-driven detection will flag to parents when conversations with children are necessary, and when best to have them. For the whole family, there is a messenger that enables private, secure, and personal messaging within the app.

TogetherAI is still early in its development, having only
been founded in 2021. According to Crunchbase,
the startup has raised A$3.7 million (around €2.4 million) in pre-seed and seed
funding.

Other mental health innovations spotted by Springwise
include an AI-powered
mental health companion, and a virtual
environment for treating phobias.

Written By: Matthew Hempstead

Mental health is a complex issue, and those in need of urgent help can find information about the services available on the United for Global Mental Health website.

Email: hello@togetherai.com

Website: togetherai.com

Reference