LUMKANI

General information

Lumkani is a social enterprise focused on overcoming the shack-fire challenge in urban slums in South Africa and across the globe.

Lumkani is underpinned by community partnerships that generate inclusive design solutions and is committed to continual innovation driven by testing and feedback.

We aim to create positive social impact by increasing the safety and security for shack-dwelling people using technology-based systems that provide early warning.

Lumkani seeks to promote business and social practices that respect people, ensure sustainability and create value.

We use innovative heat detection technology instead of smoke detection (not suited for the shack environment given the heating, lighting and cooking methods that take place in homes) to sense for fires.

Using rate-of-rise of temperature technology, we can accurately measure the incidence of harmful fires, alerting the family inside the shack of the danger.

Our devices are networked using transmission technology which connects each device within a 60 metre radius of each other. In the event of a fire, devices within this range will ring creating a community-wide response to the danger; this buys time to become proactive in rapidly spreading fire risk situations.

The device has gone through a number of iterations to arrive at the final product. Launching in November 2014, our first launch will seek to test 2000 devices in high fire risk communities in the City of Cape Town municipality. The feedback from users as well as data collected over the five months will be invaluable in redesigning the device and/or technology if the situation calls for it.

Once this period is complete, we will proceed to our large-scale roll out.