Making The Food We Eat Safer With Blockchain Technology

How depressing it would be if you started your day with the possibility that your coffee had adulterated coffee powder. Or say, the milk you drank had deadly chemicals  passed on from the cattle feed? 
 

How often do we check that the food we eat is safe, and ensure that it is free of harmful additives and adulterants? Is it even possible in the current regulatory system? Within the food supply chain between the farmer and the consumer, adulteration is a key safety issue. Since the food we eat goes through many touchpoints before it comes to our plate, ensuring food safety requires multisectoral collaboration. 
 

According to the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India, one in every five samples of food items tested by the public food safety labs in the country was found to be “adulterated and misbranded.”[1]  And, there has also been wide media coverage of the impact of adulteration, across the globe. In 2011, China’s largest processed meat manufacturer was found using illegal feed additives that contaminated its products. The consumers, industry, lawmakers and regulatory agencies were unaware of it. The government was blamed for its inability to ensure a safe food ecosystem.

Walmart, the global retailer, which has been in the forefront of adopting new technologies, partnered with IBM and Tsinghua University in China to improve the way food is tracked, transported and sold to consumers.  In October, it inaugurated the Walmart Food Safety Collaboration Center in Beijing. This helps Walmart deliver food to stores faster, reduce wastage, better manage product shelf life and also cut down logistics costs considerably.  As a result, consumers will no longer see on the store shelf, the food that is beyond its “best before” day or simply not fresh.
 

With IBM Blockchain™, food products can be tracked digitally from farm to store shelves and ultimately to consumers. This technology enables the monitoring of information such as farm origination details, batch numbers, factory and processing data, the intermediary details, expiry dates, storage temperatures and shipping details, along the entire food supply chain. 
 

Another advantage of blockchain is that the information in the shared ledger can be exposed and used as part of the data that fuels predictive analytics.  For example, a supply chain manager who puts their data on a blockchain can access it via Watson technology and provide information on the best way to optimize the supply chain.  This will ultimately lead to cost savings and increased efficiencies across the network.[2]
 

Food safety is important to all of us as we consume grown, processed and packaged food from around the world. With blockchain, companies are empowered to ensure the food we eat is safer. To know more about how foodtech companies and retailers are leveraging blockchain technology, signup for IBM Cloud Innovation Forum.