What A Bright Idea

This inspiring entrepreneur’s glow-in-the-dark invention has made rural roads safer for both animals and humans

- Dakalo Nemasetoni

FOR motorists in rural areas, it’s the stuff nightmares are made of. A dark shape suddenly appears on the road as if out of nowhere and bam! There’s animal blood and guts everywhere. And even if you’re lucky enough to not be injured yourself, your car would also likely have taken a serious knock.

Memphis Morebudi Kaotsane (35) is one of many South Africans who know the terror of navigating rural roads after dark, especially in areas without streetlights.

He was a passenger in his cousin’s car when they crashed into a donkey one night in their hometown of Taung, in the North West Province, in 2011. They were not seriously injured, but the car was a write-off.

Necessity, the old saying goes, is the mother of invention and a need to keep motorists and livestock safe spurred Memphis to figure out a way to do both. Like all great inventions, his idea was amazingly simple: why not spray paint the animals with a reflective, glow-inthe-dark paint?

It took years of tinkering and experimentation, but Memphis eventually came up with Moonshine, a reflective spray paint that’s making life on the roads a whole lot safer in the rural parts of his home province – for both humans and animals.

He entered the North West Province’s Innovation Competition in 2016 with his idea of a reflective paint for animals and won second place.

“That competition definitely gave me the platform for my dreams to come true, because before it happened, things seemed very bleak,” he says.

With the help of the provincial premier’s office, the North West development corporation and the North-West University, he decided to develop the product and take it to market.

His prize was R50000 to create a prototype and an opportunity to work with a Ventersdorp vet and a Potchefstroom-based pharmacist who assisted him with product development.