Watch: School in India's Maharashtra taps into AI potential to test food quality for tribal students 

A school in the Indian state of Maharashtra is revolutionising, with the help of Artificial Intelligence, the way the quality of the food eaten by the students is tested. AI has the potential of providing an efficient and reliable method of food quality testing.

When it was found out that 61 girls out of the 222 were malnourished in the school, AI-based equipment was installed to improve the nutrition level of tribal children at Todsa Ashram School of Etapalli village in Maharashtra's Gadchiroli city.

The initiative was taken by the administration under project Bhamragad and there are eight government schools part of it. So, the AI machine works on the basis of Image recognition. AI algorithms trained to recognize visual characteristics of food products, such as colour, texture, and shape, can detect the quality of the food.

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This technology can be used in real-time as it gives measurements of various kinds like calories, carbs, protein, fat, et cetera to assess the quality of the food.

Overall, it appears to be a great initiative by tapping into the potential of AI to improve the efficiency and accuracy of food quality testing which can lead to healthier food options for children. Just seconds after the machine captures a picture of the food plate, it makes an assessment whether the food quality is at par or not.

The machine does not require any human intervention and can be easily used by a person of any age without any difficulty.

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''When I used to come to this all-girls Ashram School, I used to feel that they lack nutrition. When we had a preliminary BMI analysis, we found that 61 girls out of the 222 were malnourished. Meals are provided here thrice a day - breakfast, lunch and dinner. The quantity of the food is up to the mark, and we also follow the menu. So, we wanted to ascertain the cause,'' Shubham Gupta, Assistant Collector of Etapalli and Project Director of Integrated Tribal Development Project told ANI.

He said that he got connected with a startup through an NGO that created a device that could evaluate the quality of food being served to the students.

“I came in touch with an NGO that further connected me to a startup. We deployed here this machine designed by them… Through this machine, we have tried to implement improvement in not only the quantity but also the quality of food. Data collected here can be accessed by Headmaster and me. We have installed it in one of the 8 Ashram Schools so far," he said.

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According to Gupta, the project is yielding positive results for the administration, and food quality has improved.

''The results are very positive. We installed it in September 2022. The quality of food has improved since then and children's BMI has also improved,'' he added.

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