The United Kingdom’s Food Standards Agency (FSA) successfully completed a pilot project in partnership with a cattle butchery in which blockchain technology was implemented for the first time as a regulatory tool in order to ensure conformity in the food sector. The program was implemented in a butchery where both parties had access to the data records with the aim of improving transparency in the supply chain of the food sector. The FSA intends to apply another pilot in the mid of July, with the goal of improving data recording in farms.
“Our focus has been to develop data standards with the industry that will turn the theory into reality and I am delighted to be able to show that blockchain technology does work in this part of the food industry. I think there are great opportunities now for industry and government to work together to expand and develop this approach”,
said Sian Thomas, a spokesperson for the FSA. The FSA says that they are currently trying to replicate the program in other production plants, and the FSA the initiative seeks a permanent blockchain adoption. They also affirm that the adoption must be led by the industry, since the information available is product of the collection of data from previous inspections, limiting FSA’s action range.
Analysts agree that blockchain technology could be a cornerstone for the food industry of the future, right now we have impressive examples of blockchain usage in the food industry as IBM, Walmart and nine other companies partnered to create a system based on blockchain technology, called Food Trust, which seeks to track the food supply chain. Frank Yiannas, Walmart’s head of food safety, described the Food Trust blockchain system as
“the equivalent of FedEx for food tracking,”
in which
“real-time data is captured at every point, in every food product.”
Food Trust includes companies such as Nestle, Dole Food, Driscoll’s, Golden State Foods, Kroger, McCormick, McLane, Tyson Foods and Unilever. The companies have been collaborating on the project since 2016, and tests began in August of 2017.
by Samuel Larreal
