Commemorating Youth Month under the theme "Accelerating youth economic emancipation for a sustainable future"

Department of Science and Innovation programme helps young woman make minibus taxi industry safer

Driven by a strong desire to make public transport safe, a young innovator has developed a transport intelligence system called "Street Governor" for the taxi industry.

Street Governor ensures regulatory compliance in real-time by increasing transparency, trust and profitability in the minibus taxi industry. The solution provides decision-support tools to passengers, taxi drivers, taxi associations, councils, government and law enforcement agencies.

Smartvein, the digital services company that owns Street Governor, was founded by Busisiwe Ndabana.  Ndabana is a beneficiary of the Grassroots Innovation Programme, which is managed by the Technology Innovation Agency, an entity of the Department of Science and Innovation. The programme aims to support the commercialisation of technology-enabled solutions to real-world problems affecting ordinary citizens.

In 2011, one of Ndabana's relative was shot returning from a taxi association meeting.  His untimely death galvanised her to fight against violence in the taxi industry.

"Contract killings, gender-based violence and harassment, femicide and exploitative behaviour by major service providers in the South African minibus taxi industry must end," she declares.

The South African National Taxi Council (Santaco) is collaborating with Smartvein to achieve this goal. All Santaco-affiliated transport formations are a part of Street Governor.

The current focus is on ensuring that contributions to unemployment insurance, pension funds and compensation for occupational injury are paid on behalf of taxi drivers.

"Our data will provide the Department of Employment and Labour with access to a database that lists non-compliant taxi operators, allowing officials to issue compliance orders against non-compliant employers. This method reduces the department's workload," she adds.

Smartvein will also soon collaborate with the Department of Higher Education and Training to develop training materials for taxi drivers through partnerships. The database will give them a better understanding of taxi drivers' training requirements.

According to Ndabana, the Street Governor system will stabilise the minibus taxi industry by identifying habitual route violators (preventing violence between rivals) and wanted criminals (enabling the South African Police Services to respond in near real-time, helping to prevent serious crimes).

Street Governor will also help close the trust gap between the taxi industry and authorities by providing the government with data to address injustices and structural issues. For example, the correlation between vehicle maintenance costs and the prevalence of potholes can spark much-needed dialogue between the minibus taxi industry and the government.

Ndabana recently completed a Senior Management Development Programme at the University of Stellenbosch Business School.  She used the Street Governor project as a case study, allowing her to receive unbiased feedback from academics who had nothing to gain or lose from her model.

So far, she has received a patent and three trademarks from the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition, but she considers the adoption of Street Governor by Santaco to be her greatest success.

For more information about the Grassroots Innovation Programme visit www.tia.org.za.