This document summarizes the Open Food Facts project, which is a free and open database of food product information from around the world. It is collaboratively built and allows anyone to add or access product data via crowdsourcing and open APIs. The project aims to increase transparency in the food industry by allowing consumers to make smarter choices through comparing products and understanding labels. Future plans include expanding to more languages and mobile apps, as well as enabling more reuses of the data.

1. Cơ sở dữ liệu miễn phí về mặt hàng thực phẩm Freie Datenbank für Nahrungsmittel
La información alimentaria libre La banca dati alimentare aperta
L'information alimentaire ouverte フリー食品データベース
Stéphane Gigandet, founder
http://openfoodfacts.org
Computer Cooking Contest 2012 - Lyon – Sept. 3rd 2012

2. Agenda
● Introduction
● Collaborating and contributing
● Uses
● Re-uses
● Technology
● Future plans
● Impact

3. The Open Food Facts project
● A database of information on food products
from all around the world
● Ingredients, nutrition facts, origins, labels, photos
etc.
● Collaborative, free and open

6. Collaborating and contributing
● Crowdsourcing model to add products
● 150 contributors added 2000 products in French
● Contributions directly from food companies
● Crowdsourcing of ideas
● Facebook contributors groups, discussion lists etc.
● 40 ideas on the Ideas Forums
– https://openfoodfactsfr.uservoice.com/ & http://openfoodfacts.uservoice.com/
● Open APIs and open source mobile app
– https://github.com/openfoodfacts/openfoodfacts-android/
– Mailing list: off-android-fr-subscribe@openfoodfacts.org

7. Missions and special operations
Operation Soda:
- collaboration with OWNI and
Terra Eco
- 150 sodas added in 1 week

8. Uses – Deciphering cryptic labels
● e.g. “E-numbers” for additives
● E150d = Sulfite ammonia caramel
● Carmine, also called Crimson Lake, Cochineal,
Natural Red 4, E120 or carminic acid
Cochineal scales breeding
Photo by Frank Vincentz, licence Creative Commons CC-BY-SA 3.0

9. Uses – Comparing products
● Products in the same category:
●

10. Uses – Fact checking
Campbell's 25% Less Sodium Tomato Soup
Same amount of salt!
$1 $1.39
Source: http://www.mouseprint.org/2010/03/08/campbells-not-25-less-sodium-tomato-soup/

11. Uses – Searching products

12. Re-uses allowed and encouraged
● Open Data licence (OdbL)
● cc-by-sa like licence for databases
● Anyone can use all the collected data for any use
(including commercial)
● Data readily available in open formats
● JSON API, CSV exports

13. Re-uses : data visualizations
Graphs are now directly available through the Search form on Open Food Facts

14. Re-use ideas
● Source of data for research: food, health,
marketing, computer science etc.
● Consumer watch
● Art, collections
● Your ideas!
● Got an idea? We can help to get the data you
need. (e.g. more products with Aspartame for a
study)

15. Technology
● Web frontend: HTML5, jquery
● Server backend: Apache, Perl, MongoDB
● Mobile apps: Phonegap, jquerymobile
● OCR (ingredients): Tesseract

16. Innovative use of common technologies
● Cameras: products instead of sunsets
● Phones: barcode readers
● Barcodes: consumers instead of cashiers

17. Future plans
● More languages, more products
● Mobile apps: Android, iOS, Windows Phone
etc.
● More uses and re-uses
● e.g. automated ingredients translation for people
traveling in foreign countries
● More collaboration and research
● Scientists, developers, students
● e.g. better OCR: ingredients on round cans?

18. Changing how we eat and cook
● More transparency to the food industry means:
● Smarter choices
● Better products (healthy, environment friendly)
● Less processed food products
● More cooking!
or
9 additives:
E331,E333,E330,E440,E415
?
E322,E503,E450,E500
http://www.lacuisinedejuliat.com/article-moelleux-biscuits-fraises-et-rhubarbe-109485909.html