A digital health startup, Eatwell Technologies, has unveiled EatWell AI, an artificial intelligence-powered nutrition and food-tracking platform designed to help users make healthier decisions based on African diets.

The company said the launch would be accompanied by efforts to integrate the platform into Nigeria’s preventive healthcare ecosystem through partnerships with healthcare professionals, healthcare providers, Health Maintenance Organisations (HMOs), pharmacies, employers and government health programmes.

EatWell AI is designed to analyse meals, track food and physical activity, and provide personalised nutrition guidance based on users’ health goals, food choices and health conditions.

The company said the platform was developed to address the limitations of existing global nutrition applications, many of which rely heavily on Western food databases and have limited information on African dishes.

EatWell AI features a proprietary glycaemic index and glycaemic load database containing more than 2,000 local dishes, including jollof rice, egusi soup, amala, moinmoin and suya.

According to the company, the database is intended to help users understand how the foods they eat could affect blood sugar, weight and metabolic health.

Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Eatwell Technologies, Jon Emerenini, said preventive healthcare should begin with everyday lifestyle choices rather than only when people become sick.

“Healthcare cannot only begin when someone becomes sick. A significant part of better health starts with what people do every day; what they eat, how active they are and whether they understand the choices they are making,” Emerenini said.

He described nutrition as an overlooked component of preventive healthcare in Africa, saying the lack of relevant data on local diets had limited the ability of digital health platforms to provide personalised support.

“Nutrition is the single most under-addressed lever in African preventive health, and it’s been ignored because nobody built the underlying data layer for how we actually eat,” he said.

Emerenini said EatWell AI was designed to go beyond conventional calorie-counting applications by providing nutrition intelligence based on African food patterns.

“EatWell AI isn’t just an app; it’s nutrition data infrastructure for Africa,” he said.

The platform allows users to photograph their meals using an AI meal scanner, which identifies and analyses food on the plate. It also provides food and calorie tracking, personalised nutrition recommendations, fitness and activity tracking, progress monitoring and nutrition coaching.

EatWell said the platform provides support for users seeking to manage their weight, diabetes and hypertension, while also helping them track individual health goals and make informed food choices.

The company said it was seeking to move beyond the traditional consumer fitness application model by connecting its digital tools with healthcare professionals and organisations.

Through the proposed partnerships, Eatwell Technologies said healthcare providers and other organisations would be able to use the platform to provide a digital layer for nutrition, lifestyle management and preventive health, while patients and individuals could continue monitoring their choices between healthcare visits.

The startup is also engaging government and healthcare stakeholders on possible deployment of EatWell AI through primary healthcare centres, with the aim of extending personalised nutrition and lifestyle support to more communities.

The company said it would also explore partnerships with corporate organisations for wellness programmes, as well as with HMOs, pharmacies, gyms and telecommunications companies to increase access to the platform.

Eatwell Technologies said its initial focus was African food and nutrition patterns, but that the platform was being expanded to international markets, particularly communities around the world that consume African cuisine.

It said the longer-term goal was to create a continuous preventive health system in which digital tools could complement the work of doctors, dietitians and other healthcare professionals rather than replace them.