From stopping child trafficking to mapping slums,
governments and companies found new ways to use technology in 2018 to help
people globally. Here are 9 new uses of technology in the past year
1) DRONE DELIVERS
VACCINE
A one-month-old baby in
Vanuatu became the first person in the world to be immunised with a vaccine
delivered by a commercial drone. UNICEF called the delivery to the Pacific
island nation as a “big leap for global health”
2) APP FINDS
CROP-MUNCHING WORM
An app which helps farmers identify pests and
diseases won the first Africawide hackathon aimed at finding solutions to
hunger. The AgriPredict app forecasts the probability of pest invasions,
including the voracious fall armyworm, which eats crops and has wreaked havoc
in sub-Saharan Africa and India
3) MOSQUITO-PACKED DRONES FIGHT THE ZIKA
OUTBREAK
Drones spraying millions of sterile mosquitoes are
helping combat Zika outbreak in Brazil. Once freed, the sterilised,
laboratory-bred male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes — which spread Zika, dengue and
yellow fever by biting humans — mate with females, but do not produce viable
eggs
4) DRONES AND SATELLITES HELP MAP SLUMS IN
INDIA
India is using drones and satellites to map informal
settlements in a bid to speed up the delivery of essential services and land
rights for slum dwellers
5) SAFETY APPS LOCATE HARASSMENT HOTSPOTS
Apps like Safecity are enabling women to flag
harassment prone areas in India to the police and transport department so they
can increase patrols and review lighting
6) SATELLITES HELP STOP FORCED LABOUR
Thailand turned to satellites to combat forced
labour in its multi-billion dollar fishing industry after the European Union
threatened to ban fish exports
7 )MACHINE CONVERTS PLASTIC TO FUEL
We now have a machine that converts plastic waste
into diesel and petrol. The idea is to encourage the collection of waste before
it ends up in oceans
8) VIRTUAL REALITY COMBATS HARASSMENT AT
WORK
VR programme by Vantage Point teaches staff how to react
when they see harassment at workplace through simulated meets
9) BLOCKCHAIN SAVES KIDS FROM TRAFFICKERS
A blockchain system, developed by ConsenSys, scans
eyes and fingerprints of kids trying to cross the border & asks legal
guardians for approval
