Rafia Ghariani

Tunisian tech innovator who revolutionized digital accessibility for people with disabilities in Africa.

Rafia Ghariani, a Tunisian software engineer, made a monumental difference by developing Nafham, the first AI-powered platform enabling visually impaired individuals to navigate digital interfaces using haptic feedback and voice commands. Born in 1985, she grew up witnessing the exclusion of disabled communities from Tunisia's tech boom.

Her breakthrough came in 2017 when she created SoundTouch, an open-source toolkit that converts visual data into sonic landscapes. This innovation earned her the UNESCO NetExplo Award in 2019. Unlike Western-centric solutions, Ghariani's technology cost 90% less than existing alternatives, making it accessible across Francophone Africa.

By 2023, Nafham had empowered over 300,000 users in 15 countries to work in IT fields previously deemed inaccessible. Her intersectional approach combining Arabic dialect recognition with disability tech created a new paradigm for inclusive design.