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Blockchain – Essential for Fresh Produce Traceability
Blockchain for fresh produce traceability
Blockchain for fresh produce traceability
The Produce Traceability Initiative, was designed to help the Produce Industry maximize the effectiveness of current traceback procedures, while developing a standardized industry approach to enhance the speed and efficiency of traceability systems for the future. …and more! Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically. Soft Fruit Juice identify the pallets on a production order Zerya Protocol Leading growers, packers and shippers of fresh produce in the U.S. and Mexico use the solution for both item- and ca
Improve operational efficiencies with the blockchain Hyperledger, Fabric, Iroha, and Indy. Fruits is able to trace the history and the location of their exported fresh produce by means of recorded identifications. We hope that the ideas presented in this article lead to a fruitful resolution of the challenges that remain for produce supply chain members seeking to implement PTI in conjunction with RFID solutions.
She said while the countries are well positioned, there are aspects that could be improved. Fresh Produce Traceability and Inventory Management and Software Updates for October 2016. All trademarks/service marks referenced on this site are properties of their respective owners.
Season will work out the price of splits from the whole price of the product and can add on price uplifts for splitting. France intensifies controls to determine traceability of Spanish fruit 100% traceability across the industry will be accomplished much easier and with greater success if the industry agrees on a single standard for the information required to be tracked and shared during a trace-back.
This in an important development and will impact retailers both locally and internationally. SPAIN. Spanish fruit and vegetable producers have still not recovered from the “cucumber crisis” in the summer of 2011, which caused a sharp decline in exports. Working with all supply chain stakeholders including the local traders and smallholders on FFB traceability.
FarmSoft Agriculture & Fresh Produce Post Harvest Software, the best farm management software.
Reference: Fruit & vegetable packing systems for fresh produce supply chain management for wholesaler, exporter, importer, quality control, dispatch, sales and packing.
Will blockchain be the holy grail of fresh produce traceability?
In December 2016, so the story is told, Frank Yiannas went to a local Walmart store and picked up a package of sliced mangoes. Returning to the office, Yiannas, Walmart’s vice president of food safety, challenged his team to find out where the mangoes had come from, and set a timer. Six days, 18 hours and 26 minutes later, an answer came back.
BLOCKCHAIN FOR FRESH FOOD SUPPLY CHAINS – REALITY SETS IN?
Blockchain for Fresh Food Supply Chains – Reality Sets In?
When it comes to implementing blockchain for fresh food supply chains, has reality set in? Back in late 2017, blockchain was seen as a messiah, of sorts, for food safety and traceability. It seemed like it was hard to go a day without seeing an article in the press about this. Blockchain was going to solve all of our supply chain problems for freshness, traceability and food safety.
Has it?
GARTNER’S OPINION
Last year, in August of 2018, Gartner, the internationally recognized analyst firm, in its Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies for 2018, positioned blockchain as entering into their “trough of disillusionment.” This means that a technology has been overhyped and people are becoming skeptical about its value. Some technologies emerge from the trough as legitimate use cases are established for the technology. Others never emerge as reality sets in that there may not be a use case that is practical or viable.
Then, in February of this year, Gartner stated in a press release “However, it will be several years before four or five major blockchain technologies become dominant. Until that happens, technology end users will be forced to integrate with the blockchain technologies and standards dictated by their dominant customers or networks. This includes integration with your existing data and analytics infrastructure. The costs of integration may outweigh any potential benefit. Blockchains are a data source, not a database, and will not replace existing data management technologies.”
In April, Gartner, issued a press release with the headline Gartner Predicts 20% of Top Global Grocers Will Use Blockchain for Food Safety and Traceability by 2025. Gartner says that consumers’ interest in fresh foods is continuing to increase and, with that, “customer understanding has increased for the source of the food, the provider’s sustainability initiative, and overall freshness. Grocery retailers who provide visibility and can certify their products according to certain standards will win the trust and loyalty of consumers.”
Then, on May 7, Gartner issued a follow-on release that is even more cautious stating: Blockchain remains a popular topic, but supply chain leaders are failing to find suitable use cases. By 2023, 90% of blockchain-based supply chain initiatives will suffer ‘blockchain fatigue’ due to a lack of strong use cases. A Gartner supply chain technology survey of user wants and needs found that only 19% of respondents ranked blockchain as a very important technology for their business, and only 9% have invested in it. This is mainly because supply chain blockchain projects are very limited and do not match the initial enthusiasm for the technology’s application in supply chain management.
Please don’t get me wrong. I am not picking on Gartner. In fact, I agree with them. They’ve been pragmatic about blockchain for a while now, cautioning people to carefully evaluate blockchain for supply chains and other use cases before jumping in with both feet. When many have been touting that blockchain is ready for prime time, Gartner is saying 20 percent of grocers will implement it by 2025 – over five years from now.
What’s been interesting is that others are now saying the same. Instead of blockchain being the solution, many are saying blockchain is a part of a broader supply chain solution and we should proceed carefully.
BLOCKCHAIN FOR FRESH FOOD SUPPLY CHAINS – WHAT’S HOLDING IT BACK
When it comes to implementing blockchain for fresh food supply chains, what’s been holding it back from widespread adoption? I believe there are three key issues:
It’s about the data: The industry is (finally) realizing that any solution – blockchain for supply chains or otherwise – is only as good as the data that goes into the solution. And, while there’s lots of industry data relating to e-commerce and what consumers buy at the grocery store as tracked through point-of-sale systems, there’s not a lot of data, particularly pallet-level granular data, about produce or protein as it moves from harvest or processing through the supply chain. Manual data collection is expensive, time-consuming and error prone. It may be paper-based or in a spreadsheet and both are rather unruly to work with when we’re talking about the volume of data needed for traceability and food safety, for example.
Blockchains for supply chains must benefit everyone in the supply chain: If someone doesn’t see a benefit in doing something, they’re not very likely to do it. So, for example, if you’re a produce supplier, you’re going to want to get some benefit from implementing it – not just the cost. Suppliers, just like anyone else, need a positive ROI for any investment.
Blockchain is not a stand-alone solution and needs to be better assessed for the value it brings to the supply chain: The value of blockchain for the fresh food supply chain is in its networking/sharing capabilities and security. It can best be viewed as a component or value add to a supply chain management solution.
WHAT’S BEST FOR BLOCKCHAIN FOR FRESH FOOD SUPPLY CHAIN SOLUTIONS
For blockchain to be a successful component of supply chain solutions, we need to solve for these issues. Specifically:
Automate data collection: IoT sensors, beginning at harvest or processing, can automatically collect data about fresh produce or proteins. This data can be wirelessly sent to cloud-based applications for processing and analysis. This reduces or eliminated impact on labor – the industry’s most precious and limited resource – and reduces data errors and costs.
Make the data useful: By collecting data about the produce or protein from the beginning of the supply chain, we can capture information and insights of value to growers, processors and suppliers such as cut-to-cool time metrics and cold chain integrity.
Integrate with a value-add solution: Use a solution that is designed to improve supply chain operations, provide traceability, transparency and visibility. As needed, integrate blockchain into that solution and control data access for each of members of supply chain, based on their need to have that access. We call this a hybrid-approach.
A HYBRID APPROACH FOR BLOCKCHAIN FOR FRESH FOOD SUPPLY CHAINS
A recent ChainLink Research report “Blockchains Role in the Produce Supply Chain” discusses the value of a hybrid approach for blockchain solutions. The report states: Blockchain technology alone cannot provide freshness, safety, provenance, and recall capabilities. That requires data and capabilities from outside the blockchain. It seems that the best emerging approach will be a hybrid consisting of 1) a centralized networked SaaS platform providing economical scalability and deep algorithmic and process capabilities, combined with 2) blockchain and smart contracts for transparency and validation. Blockchains are attractive because of their ability to create a shared, trusted single‐version‐of‐the‐truth between trading partners. However, a networked SaaS platform can provide a shared, trusted single‐version‐of‐the‐truth at a much lower cost.
Our Zest Fresh for Produce solution utilizes such a hybrid approach when it comes to implementing blockchain for the fresh food supply chain. We utilize IoT sensors to autonomously collect data, simplifying implementation and reducing costs. We provide insights for everyone across the supply chain – growers, suppliers, processors and retailers – that can benefit their business and generate a positive ROI on their investment – and we integrate with blockchain for those that want to utilize it to security share information.
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While nearly a week is an improvement over the multiple weeks some companies can take to trace a product; it is still far too long when customer safety is on the line, and a recall is urgently required. That lag time leaves a retailer with little choice but to exercise the extremely costly step of pulling all the suspect product from the shelf as a precautionary measure.
While Yiannas was initially skeptical about blockchain, Walmart decided to try it out, partnering with IBM for a trial run. As part of the test, shipments were tracked and digitally recorded via a blockchain. Pallet loads of mangoes were assigned numeric identifiers. At each stage of the supply chain, from farm to store, their status was logged.
A few months later, Yiannas performed the same task that had taken his team almost a week. An instant after keying the six-digit lot number on the web portal, the product’s history appeared on screen, tracing its journey from harvest and hot-water treatment to import, processing, cold storage, and finally its arrival at a Walmart store. The time taken was around 2 seconds. For a supply chain looking to find an optimal visibility solution, the result was compelling.
What is blockchain?
"Simply put," writes Sylvain Charlebois, professor in food distribution and policy and dean of the Faculty of Management at Dalhousie University, "blockchain technology is a way of storing and sharing information across a network of users in an open virtual space. Blockchain technology allows for users to look at all transactions simultaneously and in real time. In food, for example, a retailer would know with whom his supplier has dealt. Additionally, since transactions are not stored in any single location, the information is almost impossible to hack."
Such information allows supply chain partners to more quickly collaborate and optimize their operations. Consumers could also benefit from the instant access to visibility. By just reading a QR code with a smartphone, Charlebois notes customers could see the product’s history. In the case of a piece of meat, for example, information might include the animal’s birth and use of antibiotics as well as processing and supply chain information.
Visibility into product history details, such as country of origin and fair trade, may offer an advantage to smaller or mid-sized suppliers who have not developed a brand reputation.
Development continues
Walmart, which has already undergone blockchain tests with mangoes in North America and pork in China, recently joined IBM, Chinese retailer JD.com, and Tsinghua University National Engineering Laboratory for E-Commerce Technologies to form the Blockchain Food Safety Alliance, dedicated to improving food tracking and safety in China. In August 2017, a U.S. collaboration was announced, including IBM, Dole, Driscoll’s, Golden State Foods, Kroger, McCormick and Company, McLane Company, Nestlé, Tyson Foods, Unilever, and Walmart.
In the UK, a blockchain collaboration between Sainsbury, packaging company Sappi and three financial services companies recently formed, along with several technology startups, to track and verify contracts with tea farmers from the country of Malawi in Africa. The group is looking to connect with up to 10,000 farmers and offer preferential pricing to those who use sustainable farming methods designed to increase yields.
Next steps
While excitement around blockchain is enormous, whether or not it will become the "Holy Grail" of traceability remains to seen. Roman Kuhar of Compac advises fresh produce growers and packing houses to align themselves with partners who understand the technology and who can help you implement it. He believes that consumer demand for transparency will drive innovation and that "packhouses and growers that adopt a blockchain driven traceability will become the gold standard for innovation and food safety."
Others tread cautiously. Harry Smit of Rabobank cautions that two prerequisites are required for companies to achieve success. "First, processes within companies, and between companies, have to become digitalized and standardized," he says. "Second, a broad participation of stakeholders along the value chain is required; otherwise the value of blockchain is lost." Nonetheless, Rabobank recommends that companies participate in more than one blockchain initiative while maintaining flexibility to switch to others.
Charlebois echoes the need for participation. "The most important challenge remains participation," he writes. "All parties must adopt the technology in order for it to work. In food distribution, not all companies are equal, and some can exercise their power more than others. A successful integration of the blockchain requires the engagement of all participating organizations." He states that further research is needed "before we get too excited."
Fresh produce on blockchain
While demand for fresh produce grows as people strive to eat healthier and look for more choice in their fruits and vegetables, the challenges around food safety and freshness persist. Across the industry’s highly complex, cross-border supply chain, challenges range from issues around the origins and quality of farm products to shrinkage and spoilage resulting from improper handling and storage.
How can IBM Food Trust help?
IBM Food Trust™ understands the challenges facing the fresh produce industry. That’s why we are dedicated to building trust and transparency and empowering seamless collaboration throughout the cross-border ecosystem with blockchain.
Learn more
Providing proof of origin and accelerated tracking
The Trace module enables end-to-end supply chain visibility, cutting the time needed to track a food source from days to seconds. Know the provenance of fruits and vegetables and their status to mitigate the spread of contamination and prevent waste in the case of a food borne illness outbreak.
Building consumer demand and brand trust
The Consumer module shares the journey of fresh produce. Connect shoppers to specific, permissioned information that helps influence buying decisions, such as origin, quality and sustainability practices.
Streamlining produce handling and reducing food waste
The Insights capabilities module provides near real-time supply chain data, including information on temperature and product movement. Leveraging blockchain and IoT technology, Hyper Insights enables better handling and transportation of perishable fruits and vegetables as well as dynamically optimizing inventory management.
Enabling reliable documentation across the supply chain
The Documents module allows participants to upload, manage, edit and share any documents along the supply chain. Improve information management, demonstrate organic and sustainability growth practices and show compliance with quality standards.
Use case
Enabling a global retail giant to trace leafy greens back to the farm
In 2018, a multistate outbreak of E coli-related illnesses linked to romaine lettuce started making headlines. Walmart had recently completed a food traceability pilot on the IBM Food Trust platform in which it reduced the time required to trace a box of mangos back to farm from 7 days to 2.2 seconds.
As a result of the successful pilot, the company sent a letter to all its leafy green suppliers asking them to join the IBM Food Trust-enabled Walmart Food Traceability Initiative. The goal was to have leafy green suppliers be able to instantaneously trace every product back to its farm, by production lot, within a year.
What Does Blockchain Mean for Fresh Produce?
Blockchain offers a range of benefits for the fresh produce industry. It promises greater transparency and traceability in supply chains; implicating improved productivity and greater food safety. By providing logistical insight, and increased control over produce; blockchain could help fresh produce businesses reduce costs, scale production, and invest in focused growth.
What is blockchain in fresh produce?
In short, blockchain is a digital platform that records transactions in a verifiable and permanent way. As a transaction occurs it is recorded on a shared ledger. The shared ledger is distributed across the entire ‘chain’ (of users), meaning the data is distributed and stored instantaneously across the network. This means that a transaction can be trusted as its details are verified by the network at large.
With blockchain, the movement of fresh produce is recorded at each hand-off. If, for example, a container of avocados is loaded for transit, the handler will log key data; such as location, time and provenance. As every handler enters this data, every item will have a full, traceable history with records at every point of its journey from farm to store. This data can be shared to designated participants in the blockchain and helps build consensus.
How will blockchain impact fresh produce businesses?
Blockchain will benefit growers, pickers, and packers by making them more efficient. For fresh produce businesses, this could mean speedier, more reliable supply chains – helping them to improve customer loyalty and maximize sales.
Blockchain
What It Is, What It Isn't, and What It Means for the Produce Industry
Ed Treacy, Vice President, Sustainability & Supply Chain Efficiencies for the International Fresh Produce Association. Image: MZMC
As is often the case with hot new technologies, there is an imbalance between the lofty hype surrounding blockchain and the low percentage of regular people who understand what it is.
A Wall Street Journal reporter earlier this year jokingly suggested cutting through the blockchain hype by changing every mention on the internet of the word "blockchain" into "multiple copies of giant Excel spreadsheet." Indeed, it is a useful, if oversimplified way of thinking about blockchain ledgers.
Importantly, "blockchain is not a specific software, it is a methodology for sharing data between trading partners," says Ed Treacy, Vice President, Sustainability & Supply Chain Efficiencies for IFPA (formerly PMA), who delivered a presentation called Exploring the Power of Blockchain Technology a PMA Fresh Connections: China conference in Shenzhen.
Chart describing Centralized vs. Distributed vs. Decentralized Blockchange
Another key difference between a blockchain record and, say, multiple Excel sheets: according to Treacy, blockchain is, "a unique type of ledger where you can't change the data and you can't delete the data: once it's there, it's there, and nobody else can change it."
Though far from buying into the idea that blockchain is the be-all and end-all new tool for companies to store and share data, Treacy nevertheless thinks the blockchain-based solutions will be adopted across a wide range of industries, and will be, "transformational for the grocery industry," including growers and suppliers of fresh produce.
"In the produce world, blockchain is a protocol for sharing information in a decentralized environment that enables the information to move securely through the supply chain at the same speed as the product," says Treacy. "Depending on how it's configured, you can authorize on certain parties to unlock your data. Everybody will have the data as part of the blockchain, because we want them to pass it on to the next link in the supply chain, but they won't necessarily be able to read it."
Blockchain can be used to add and automatically distribute data at each link in the supply chain, but can be tailored to control which parties have access to what data.
Blockchain can be used to add and automatically distribute data at each link in the supply chain, but can be tailored to control which parties have access to what data.
Blockchain solutions are already being deployed commercially by companies like HarvestMark (China), whose President, Dan Sun, presented alongside Treacy at Fresh Connections: China. For example, HarvestMark's parent company, Trimble, has used blockchain solutions in North America for managing shipping load assignment and contracting. According to Sun, "one carrier reduced contract management headcounts from 12 to 3 and increased revenue by $3.5 million through better matching capacity and demand."
Trimble Blockchain Application in production RFP to Engage Bid to shipper view to carrier view
But for the traceability applications where blockchain is mostly likely to find widespread use in the fresh produce industry, much of the technology is still in the pilot phase.
Treacy related how Walmart, in a pilot project with IBM, was able to use blockchain-based supply chain tracing to cut down the time needed to produce a complete record of the journey of a pack of pre-sliced mangoes from orchard in Mexico to cash register in the US: assembling the data went from almost a week down to 2.2 seconds. "If that was a food safety outbreak, a lot of people would have gotten sick in that six days and 22 hours," it took to trace the product prior to a blockchain solution being in place.
One male Blockchain team member from Walmart speaks with one female blockchain team member from walmart.
Members of Walmart's blockchain team. Image: Walmart.
IBM, a leading proponeMembers of Walmart's blockchain team. Image: Walmart.nt of commercial blockchain solutions, subsequently announced last year that it is partnering with major US grocery retailers including Walmart, Kroger and Wegmans, along with 10 major suppliers, including Driscoll's and Dole, to "apply blockchain to the food supply chain to improve food safety and ingredient transparency."
Treacy has joined into the process to represent the interests of fresh produce suppliers in the process: "We want to make sure that what [IBM] comes up with is going to work for most produce companies," not just the biggest suppliers who can afford large investments in enterprise software solutions. Additionally, Treacy hopes to shape blockchain solutions that will not force companies to completely change their processes: "Going forward, blockchain has to be complementary to existing business practices."
Other global pilot food blockchain projects highlighted by Treacy include JD.com working with an Australian beef exporter, Australian grain producers, and work being done by Alibaba, Microsoft and a startup named Ripe.io.
"Blockchain is not figured out yet," says Treacy. "In the world of produce, we're still figuring out the best way to use it where the value is, so it's a very exciting time to part of the process of forming and shaping" how blockchain will be applied to the fresh produce industry.
“Fresh produce can spend 50% of its life in transit.”
– Logistics Bureau
The longer fresh produce spends in transit, the greater the risk of defects such as discoloration and food-browning. Blockchain could provide an answer.
Fresh Food Traceability
With access to data charting the journey of fresh produce, growers can utilize data stored on the blockchain to identify slow-moving items or produce that lays dormant before collection. Moreover, being able to map supply lines could open the door to potential pooling opportunities, or to previously unknown routes.
It will also allow suppliers to manage demand more effectively. The very same data could be manipulated to identify issues such as overstocking or stock-outs – helping to ensure resources are utilized optimally and reduce the likelihood of wasted journeys or unnecessary loads.
The technology will also reduce administration overheads by automating documentation. Vital information – such as bill of lading, invoices and certificates – will be shared via the blockchain. This allows for quick hand-offs and decreases the likelihood of timely mistakes.
Ultimately, greater traceability and efficiency will make for quicker, more reliable supply chains – helping suppliers to improve relationships with retailers, and maximize profits.
With blockchain, suppliers can improve the safety and quality of produce.
Smart Contracts
While time and distance certainly affect the freshness of produce, variable conditions are another potential problem. Fresh goods are sensitive to temperature fluctuations and are highly susceptible to contamination.
With blockchain, suppliers can implement smart contracts, which helps maximize freshness. A smart contract digitally facilitates, verifies, or enforces contract terms via the blockchain. Users can personalize a smart contract to suit their needs; a fresh food supplier might, for example, ascribe a temperature limit to fresh produce containers.
With an RFID sensor, suppliers can track the temperature and humidity conditions at each link in the supply chain. This gives suppliers access to historical data relaying conditions from an origin, through warehouses and carriers, all the way to the store.
With an RFID sensor, suppliers will be able to tell if a smart contract has been broken instantly. If, for example, the temperature of a container arrives in store above a prescribed temperature limit, suppliers will know and might penalize the previous carrier. This way, the root cause of defects can be identified and resolved quickly. This will help reduce the loss of produce as it moves through the supply chain.
The RFID sensor will make each handler accountable to the next, and an attached smart contract will ensure handlers comply with the requirements stipulated by growers. This helps decrease waste without any need for a costly enforcement strategy. The ability to maintain produce as it moves along the supply chain will improve the quality of goods, meaning suppliers generate more value and increase profits.
Blockchain will allow for greater logistical and operational capacity; enabling suppliers to build efficiency, trust, and reliability into the foundation of their business. With the fundamentals covered, fresh produce businesses can scale-up and maximize gains.
Fresh Produce Software and Blockchain
For many years, Velosio’s partner LINKFRESH has supported grower-to-retailer traceability, including GTIN adoption and PTI compliance. Blockchain represents a leap forward enabling LINKFRESH users to securely share their traceability data throughout the fresh produce supply chain.
Blockchain means our customers now have a secure and indelible way of publishing their traceability data to those that need it, such as retailers and other supply chain parties.
To help suppliers get started, Walmart worked with IBM Food Trust to provide education and onboarding support. Today, the majority of the retailer’s leafy green suppliers are using blockchain technology.
Exploring the Implications of Blockchain Technology in Fresh Produce
Food and Beverage
ERPAptean Food & Beverage ERPFresh Produce & FarmingData ManagementSupply ChainTraceabilityBlockchain
Assorted colorful fruits.
While blockchain technology first broke into the public consciousness with the financial success of Bitcoin, Ethereum and other cryptocurrencies, new applications for this emergent platform are now being developed and implemented in industries like food and beverage. The implications are particularly significant for the fresh produce sector, where time is of the essence and food safety is a primary concern.
Adoption is increasing rapidly, with more than 20% of the top global companies having committed to deploying blockchain solutions by 2025 and leaders such as Kraft Heinz, Tyson and Nestlé already on board. The technology can unlock improvement across operational functions and represents a significant step forward in supply chain management capabilities.
Here, we’ll examine two key characteristics of blockchain technology and their impacts on critical concerns for fresh produce businesses.
A Single Secure Ledger Improves Traceability, Efficiency and Inventory Management
As a fully digital platform for information exchange that updates in real time, blockchain technology’s unified and completely secure ledger facilitates the creation of an uncompromisingly accurate and resilient supply chain. Considering how many aspects of food and beverage operations rest on the integrity and accessibility of data, there are several areas in which this can have a positive impact.
First, there’s traceability, which is improved by blockchain through the use of automatic information collection and end-to-end visibility. When the process of record-keeping is entrusted to devices built for that purpose and all partners along the supply chain share the same record, the accuracy and accessibility of your facts and figures can be assured.
Industry leaders are eager to unlock these advantages, as evidenced by 22% of respondents indicating that traceability via blockchain will be a priority in the coming year according to IDC’s Global Food and Beverage Trends and Strategic Insights 2021 commissioned by Aptean.
Inventory management efforts can also benefit from the implementation of blockchain management. Because material and product details are logged every step of the way and automatically imported upon receipt via the scanning of a smart label, your fresh produce business will always know exactly what’s in stock, what’s in transit and what needs to be ordered or shipped.
One final facet of fresh produce businesses that stands to gain from the deployment of blockchain solutions is efficiency. With your staff relieved of the responsibility of manual reporting processes, they can spend less time on paperwork and more on important production-related tasks that affect output and revenue.
Smart Contracts Ensure Optimal Food Quality and Customer Satisfaction
Blockchain technology can also help ensure excellent product quality and consumer experience by utilizing smart contracts. These are digital implementations of agreements between businesses with regards to the storage conditions and critical characteristics of fresh produce.
RFID sensors synced with the unified blockchain ledger allow for automatic readings of temperature, humidity and other factors important to preserving fruit and vegetable freshness. That way, your organization will know if your predetermined requirements aren’t met by suppliers or transport providers, helping you weed out items that aren’t fit for store shelves and foodservice deliveries and thereby protecting brand reputation.
You’ll be able to rest easy with that level of transparency, knowing that your products are handled with due care. Such a setup also encourages accountability between supply chain partners, which can lead to reduced waste from spoiled goods and botched shipments. As a result, your operations are both more profitable and more sustainable.
Integrating with Your Fresh Produce Enterprise Resource Planning Solution
While the utility of blockchain in fresh produce is undeniable, implementing it with your existing enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution may simply not be a possibility. It is still a relatively new technology, and not all systems are designed to facilitate its use as of yet.
Aptean’s solutions are different, though. We have the advantage of our partnership with Microsoft and their Dynamics 365 platform, which can integrate use of blockchain for data management. We also have in-depth knowledge of the fresh produce sector, with many leading providers among our clients, and can help implement our best-in-class Aptean Fresh Produce ERP at your organization.
We pride ourselves on reliability, with 99.5% uptime and, in the case of increasingly popular cloud deployments, redundant offsite servers and automatically applied updates. Our support teams are always ready to troubleshoot any issues you might encounter.
Block-chain for fresh produce:
Blockchain offers a range of benefits for the fresh produce industry. It promises greater transparency and traceability in supply chains; implicating improved productivity and greater food safety. By providing logistical insight, and increased control over produce; block-chain could help fresh produce businesses reduce costs, scale production, and invest in focused growth.
Block-chain bar-codes for fresh produce:
Checkout farmsoft's "block-chain bar-code" feature: apply a block-chain bar-code to your trade units and allow customers to scan the bar-code to instantly access the block-chain for traceability purposes, creating fantastic transparency and customer confidence.
Blockchain technology drives growth in the fresh food industry
Radical transparency delivers insights across the blockchain food value chain
Evolving technologies are spurring collaboration, partnerships, investment, and new opportunities to improve product quality and reduce food waste. Our latest report offers unique insights into blockchain food innovations and their effect on this rapidly growing market.
Radical transparency and renewed trust
Blockchain technology is establishing new forms of trust across the food industry supply chain while promising better quality food for end consumers. How? Radical transparency.
Radical transparency via blockchain technology offers food producers, distributors, and retailers detailed insights and data about fresh produce as it makes its way from seed to sale. The blockchain food value chain has the potential to deliver new benefits to the fresh food industry. With radical transparency:
Global food supply chains that struggle with fraud, corruption, false claims, and gray-market trading can verify freshness, improve traceability, and re-capture consumer confidence
Buyers challenged by previous market inefficiencies and missing information can modify their purchasing decisions based on more relevant, up-to-date product characteristics informed by blockchain food insights
Growers, distributors, and 3PLs can identify root cause quality failures early on and avoid repercussions.
The emerging blockchain economy for food Download the report
Partnerships, co-investments, and virtual vertical integration
While supplier and customer collaboration, such as joint business planning, are not new concepts in the grocery industry, more granular information sharing, progress tracking, and benefit measurement have proved challenging for partners. With blockchain food technology, concepts such as freshness-based contracts, rather than quantity-based contracts, have the potential to overcome those challenges. More trusted information helps align value chain compensation on attributes that are most relevant to consumers. This approach allows partners to share freshness KPIs, from Internet of Things sensors, and develop new grading and pricing guidelines, prior to transactions occurring. This creates win-win solutions for the entire blockchain food value chain, as buyers can now source and pay based on quality.
Similar capabilities would enable retailers to identify suboptimal cold chain performance from their suppliers, for example, and co-invest in shared mobile cooling units to improve product quality during peak seasons when suppliers suffer from inadequate precooling throughput.
Virtual vertical integration could also create opportunities for organisations to exert control through compliance and incentives, in a similar way to vertical integration, without having to take operational control.
What is block-chain in fresh produce?
In short, block-chain is a digital platform that records transactions in a verifiable, and permanent way. As a transaction occurs it is recorded on a shared ledger. The shared ledger is distributed across the entire ‘chain’ (of users), meaning the data is distributed and stored instantaneously across the network. This means that a transaction can be trusted as its details are verified by the network at large.
With block-chain, the movement of fresh produce is recorded at each hand-off. If, for example, a container of avocados are loaded for transit, the handler will log key data; such as location, time and provenance. As every handler will enter this data, every item will have a full, traceable history with records at every point of its journey from farm to store. This data can be shared to designated participants in the block-chain, and helps build consensus.
blockchain fresh produce traceability
blockchain fresh produce traceability
How will block-chain impact fresh produce businesses?
Blockchain will benefit growers, pickers, and packers by making them more efficient. For fresh produce businesses, this could mean speedier, more reliable supply chains - helping them to improve customer loyalty and maximize sales.
“Fresh produce can spend 50% of its life in transit.”
- Logistics Bureau
The longer fresh produce spends in transit, the greater the risk of defects such as discoloration and food-browning. Block-chain could provide an answer.
Traceability
With access to data charting the journey of fresh produce, growers can utilize data stored on the block-chain to identify slow-moving items or produce that lays dormant before collection. Moreover, being able to map supply lines could open the door to potential pooling opportunities, or to previously unknown routes.
It will also allow suppliers to manage demand more effectively. The very same data could be manipulated to identify issues such as overstocking or stock-outs will help ensure resources are utilized optimally and reduce the likelihood of wasted journeys or unnecessary loads.
blockchain fresh produce traceability
block-chain fresh produce traceability
The technology will also reduce admin-overheads by automating documentation. Vital information - such as bill of lading, invoices and certificates - will be shared via the block-chain. This allows for quick hand-offs and decreases the likelihood of timely mistakes.
Ultimately, greater traceability and efficiency will make for quicker, more reliable supply chains - helping suppliers to improve relationships with retailers, and maximize profits.
With block-chain, suppliers are able to improve the safety and quality of produce.
Smart Contracts
While time and distance certainly affect the freshness of produce, variable conditions are another potential problem. Fresh goods are sensitive to temperature fluctuations and highly susceptible to contamination.
With block-chain, suppliers are able to implement smart contracts, which helps maximize freshness. A smart contract digitally facilitates, verifies, or enforces contract terms via the block-chain. Users can personalize a smart contract to suit their needs; a fresh food supplier might, for example, ascribe a temperature limit to fresh produce containers.
With an RFID sensor suppliers are able to track the temperature and humidity of conditions at each link in the supply chain. This gives suppliers access to historical data relaying conditions from an origin, through warehouses and carriers, all the way to the store.
With an RFID sensor, suppliers will be able to tell if a smart contract has been broken instantly. If, for example, the temperature of a container arrives in store above a prescribed temperature limit, suppliers will know and might penalize the previous carrier. This way, the root cause of defects can be identified and resolved quickly. This will help reduce the loss of produce as it moves through the supply chain.
blockchain fresh produce traceability
block-chain fresh produce traceability
The RFID sensor will make each handler accountable to the next, and an attached smart contract will ensure handlers comply with the requirements stipulated by growers. This helps decrease waste without any need for a costly enforcement strategy. The ability to maintain produce as it moves along the supply chain will improve the quality of goods, meaning suppliers generate more value and increase profits.
Block-chain will allow for greater logistical and operational capacity; enabling suppliers to build efficiency, trust, and reliability into the foundation of their business. With the fundamentals covered, fresh produce businesses can scale-up and maximize gains.
Fresh produce block-chain for fruit & vegetable traceability & supply chain transparency
OPEN SOURCE TRACEABILITY
Introducing Hyperledger, the open source Linux Foundation managed block-chain collaborative effort to advance cross industry block-chain technologies. Hyperledger has the ultimate goal to create an open, standardized enterprise quality distributed ledger framework.
HYPERLEDGER FABRIC
Hyperledger Fabric is a business block-chain framework hosted by the Linux Foundation intended as a foundation for developing block-chain applications or solutions with a modular architecture. Hyperledger Fabric allows components such as consensus and membership services to be plug-and-play.
Fresh produce blockchain for fruit & vegetable traceability
BUILDING BLOCK-CHAIN FOR FRESH PRODUCE
The farmsoft team has committed to building open transparent block-chain solutions for the fresh produce, fruit and vegetable industry. These supply chain integrations will be added to the existing suite of farmsoft business management tools.
HYPERLEDGER SAWTOOTH
Hyperledger Sawtooth is a modular platform for building, deploying, and running distributed ledgers. Hyperledger Sawtooth includes a novel consensus algorithm, Proof of Elapsed Time (PoET), which targets large distributed validator populations with minimal resource consumption.
HYPERLEDGER IROHA
Hyperledger Iroha is a business block-chain framework designed to be simple and easy to incorporate into infrastructural projects requiring distributed ledger technology.
HYPERLEDGER INDY
Hyperledger Indy is a distributed ledger, purpose-built for decentralized identity. It provides tools, libraries, and reusable components for creating and using independent digital identities rooted on block-chains or other distributed ledgers for interoperability.
The fresh produce block-chain module is fully integrated with the farmsoft post harvest management solution...
Fresh produce block-chain for fruit & vegetable traceability & supply chain transparency
Post Harvest Traceability / Packhouse Software / Food Manufacturing solution:
Post harvest software to reduce waste, improve traceability / quality control & packing efficiency. FarmSoft post harvest software delivers easy , inventory, processing, grading sorting, labeling, employee tracking, sales, dispatch & shipping/export control.Post harvest traceability software
learn more about farmsoft post harvest traceability solutions now…
INVENTORY & COLD STORE
Full bar-code inventory & pallet management, stock take (mobile & PC), pallet control, inventory labels (raw & finished), cold store, 3D storage, container management...
SALES MANAGEMENT
Manage & monitor orders, contracts, dispatch process. Managed dispatch process guides teams to dispatch correct goods with correct invoices & documentation...
BATCH PACKING
Re-pack, sort, grade, wash, manufacture, and pack with maximum traceability . Monitor cost & waste. Recursive traceability over multiple batches for value adding...
QUALITY CONTROL
Perform QC from phone / tablet / PC. Configure internal tests, customer QC, QMS, Walmart, USDA, Loblaw, Tesco, Woolworths, Aldi, Coles, and other tests...
Fresh produce blockchain for fruit & vegetable traceability
Fresh produce block-chain for fruit & vegetable traceability
TRACEABILITY
Make recalls super easy! Perform instant recalls using any of these recall methods: invoice number, inventory number, order number, pallet number, delivery date, customer name, storage location, pack date and more...
LIVE DEMO
FRESH PRODUCE BLOCKCHAIN FOR FRUIT & VEGETABLE TRACEABILITY & SUPPLY CHAIN TRANSPARENCY
SIMPLE TRACEABILITY SOLUTION, OR COMPREHENSIVE ENTERPRISE MANAGEMENT
Blockchain traceability for fruit & vegetable packing operations, and also manage inventory, quality, packing staff, orders, sales, dispatch, and invoicing.