Project to Develop an Interoperable Seafood Traceability Technology Architecture: Issues Brief

The Interoperable Seafood Traceability Technology Architecture Issues Brief reflects the growing need to establish a global, secure, interoperable support system for seafood traceability. Establishing effective traceability systems relies on the development of a cohesive and consistent approach to the delivery of information technology capabilities and functions. The ability of business to utilize traceability for commercial gain is heavily influenced by the supply chain in which they operate. The Issues Brief describes factors associated with enterprise‐level traceability systems that will impact the design of technology architecture suited to enabling whole chain interoperable traceability. The Brief details why a technology architecture is required, what it means for industry in terms of benefits and opportunities, and how the architecture will translate into practical results. The current situation of many heterogeneous proprietary systems prevents global interoperable traceability from occurring. Utilizing primary research and lessons learned from other industries, the Brief details how the present situation can be addressed. This will enable computerized information systems to communicate syntactically by sharing standardized packages of data. The subsequent stage, semantic interoperability, is achieved by establishing a common language (ontology). The report concludes with a series of recommendations that industry can act upon to design a technology architecture suited to enabling effective global interoperable traceability.     

Current Barriers to Large‐scale Interoperability of Traceability Technology in the Seafood Sector

Interoperability is a critical component of full‐chain digital traceability, but is almost nonexistent in the seafood industry. Using both quantitative and qualitative methodology, this study explores the barriers impeding progress toward large‐scale interoperability among digital traceability systems in the seafood sector from the perspectives of seafood companies, technology vendors, and supply chains as a whole. We highlight lessons from recent research and field work focused on implementing traceability across full supply chains and make some recommendations for next steps in terms of overcoming challenges and scaling current efforts.     

Implementing Interoperability in the Seafood Industry: Learning from Experiences in Other Sectors

Interoperability of communication and information technologies within and between businesses operating along supply chains is being pursued and implemented in numerous industries worldwide to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of operations. The desire for greater interoperability is also driven by the need to reduce business risk through more informed management decisions. Interoperability is achieved by the development of a technology architecture that guides the design and implementation of communication systems existing within individual businesses and between businesses comprising the supply chain. Technology architectures are developed through a purposeful dialogue about why the architecture is required, the benefits and opportunities that the architecture offers the industry, and how the architecture will translate into practical results. An assessment of how the finance, travel, and health industries and a sector of the food industry—fresh produce—have implemented interoperability was conducted to identify lessons learned that can aid the development of interoperability in the seafood industry. The findings include identification of the need for strong, effective governance during the establishment and operation of an interoperability initiative to ensure the existence of common protocols and standards. The resulting insights were distilled into a series of principles for enabling syntactic and semantic interoperability in any industry, which we summarize in this article. Categorized as “structural,” “operational,” and “integrative,” the principles describe requirements and solutions that are pivotal to enabling businesses to create and capture value from full chain interoperability. The principles are also fundamental to allowing governments and advocacy groups to use traceability for public good.     

The Expanding Role of Traceability in Seafood: Tools and Key Initiatives

In the last decade, a range of drivers within the seafood sector have incentivized the application of traceability to issues beyond food safety and inventory management. Some of the issues motivating the expanded use of traceability within the global seafood sector include: increased media attention on the legal and social risks within some seafood supply chains, governmental traceability requirements, private‐sector sustainability commitments, and others. This article begins with an overview of these topics in the seafood industry, and why many nongovernment organizations (NGOs), companies, and government actors have turned to traceability as a tool to address them. We discuss how traceability connects to key requirements of environmental sustainability and social responsibility. Later, we review the range of traceability services, tools, software solutions, and the due diligence measures that are currently being leveraged within the seafood sector. The paper concludes with a discussion of several NGO‐ and industry‐led traceability initiatives that are examples of seafood traceability improvements.     

Assessing the Value and Role of Seafood Traceability from an Entire Value‐Chain Perspective

The traceability practices and systems of 48 separate seafood businesses were assessed as part of an evaluation of 9 global seafood value chains (from catch to point of sale to the consumer). The purpose was to gain insights and provide knowledge about the impact of traceability on improving seafood industry business performance, including reducing waste, and enhancing consumer trust. In addition, the project developed and delivered a tool that can be used by stakeholders that are seeking to better understand the return on investment of implementation of traceability practices and solutions. Using structured and semistructured interviews of over 80 individuals, the research revealed that traceability is more highly valued by businesses, regardless of their size, if they engage more often in highly collaborative activities with their suppliers and customers. A survey in 5 nations about consumer perceptions with regards to seafood and the key factors influencing their purchasing decisions delivered insights into the discrete choices that consumers make when buying seafood products. The consumer survey data were incorporated into a “Discrete Choice Simulator” that others can use to compare and contrast the preferences of consumers in these countries and better understand what factors regarding traceability impact on their buying decisions. The research concluded with several recommendations for businesses, governments, and nongovernment organizations.     

Challenges in the Traceability of Seafood

The increasing global trade of foods and animal feeds have to be channelled in right directions to guarantee product safety, transparency and the protection of consumer health. According to this fact the European Regulation (EC) No 178/2002 lays down the common principle for implementing traceability systems in product supply chains. However, seafood is a highly perishable food item which is increasingly global traded so that a lot of particular conditions and difficulties more have to be taken into account compared to other food products. This review discusses the relevant regulations for traceability in seafood and gives a survey about the most important analysis techniques for characterizing seafood.     

Challenges in the Traceability of Seafood

The increasing global trade of foods and animal feeds have to be channelled in right directions to guarantee product safety, transparency and the protection of consumer health. According to this fact the European Regulation (EC) No 178/2002 lays down the common principle for implementing traceability systems in product supply chains. However, seafood is a highly perishable food item which is increasingly global traded so that a lot of particular conditions and difficulties more have to be taken into account compared to other food products. This review discusses the relevant regulations for traceability in seafood and gives a survey about the most important analysis techniques for characterizing seafood. Received: September 17, 2007     

Seafood Traceability in the United States: Current Trends,System Design,and Potential Applications

Increasing globalization of our food supply combined with recent outbreaks of foodborne disease has heightened concerns over food safety issues around the globe. In response to these growing concerns, both by government and consumers, many nations are looking at food traceability as a means to restore confidence in the food supply and limit damages incurred by the sale and distribution of unsafe products. Traceability, which allows for the tracking of food products through all steps of production, distribution, and sales, can provide information on the nature, origin, and quality of a product; allowing consumers to make more informed purchasing decisions while providing the mechanisms for quick and thorough product recall procedures. Implementing traceablity systems will require improved vertical intergration between entities and the development of standars for the collection and dissemination of traceability data. Fortunately, rapid advances in information technology have made it possible to implement traceability systems within the food industry. This review will explore the current trends toward tracebility in the U.S. seafood industry. Current legislation, both here and abroad, and its effects on the seafood industry will be explored, and the design of a traceability system will be discussed.     

Framework for implementing traceability system in the bulk grain supply chain

Implementation of a traceability system in the bulk grain supply chain is a complex task. Grain lots are often commingled to meet buyer specifications and the lot-identity is not maintained. In this paper, a systems approach is used to develop methods for implementing bulk grain supply chain traceability in the United States, that includes both internal and chain traceability. First, the usage requirements of a traceability system are defined for all the actors in the supply chain. Second, a model is developed for implementing internal traceability system for a grain elevator that handles specialty grain. Then, we develop a model for information exchange between the supply chain actors. The model shows what grain lot information must be recorded and then passed on to the next actor. A sequence diagram is developed to show the information exchange in the grain supply chain when a user requests additional information about a suspect product. Finally, we discuss some suitable technologies to enable this information exchange. A few sample XML documents are shown for the transfer and sharing of information in the grain supply chain.     

食品供应链可追溯体系研究

建立食品及其供应链活动准确、及时的可追溯体系已经成为食品行业健康发展的一个主要因素。文中主要讨论了食品供应链及其可追溯体系的概念、可追溯系统的分类及特征、用于可追溯体系建立的技术及其发展等内容。同时指出了有关食品可追溯体系后续有待研究的一些问题。     

A Guidance Document on the Best Practices in Food Traceability

Several regulatory agencies around the world are involved in rulemaking to improve the traceability of foods. Given the complexity of the global food system, guidance on improving traceability practices across the entire food industry is a challenge. A review of the current regulations and best practices indicates that “one back, one forward” is the minimum traceability requirement. There are also no uniform requirements across different food sectors, supply chains, or countries for collection of Critical Tracking Events (CTEs) and Key Data Elements (KDEs). There is a need for standardized and harmonized requirements across all food sectors compared with developing specialized rules and mandates, including exceptions, for specific foods. This document presents food traceability best practices guidance and it addresses the unknowns and gaps in understanding and the broad applicability of a CTE–KDE framework. It applies this framework to 6 food sectors as bakery, dairy, meat and poultry, processed foods, produce, and seafood. An analysis of similarities and differences across these sectors is conducted to determine broader applicability to other foods. Fifty‐five experts from 11 countries were involved in developing this guidance. This guidance document is intended for regulatory agencies and the food industry. Regulators will find it useful in developing regulations and/or guidance applicable to most foods. Industry will find the minimum criteria that are necessary to manage a proper food traceability system, with the understanding that companies can choose to exceed the minimum level of criteria established. This guidance is intended to serve as a step toward consistent baseline requirements for food traceability.     

SEAFOODplus – how to provide health promoting, safe seafood of high eating quality to consumers

The strategic objective of the SEAFOODplus Integrated Project is to reduce health problems and to increase well-being among European consumers by applying the benefits obtained through consumption of health promoting and safe seafood products of high eating quality. The relevance of seafood in the diet to diminish the increased incidences of e.g. cardiovascular, cancer and inflammatory diseases is being assessed by performing dietary intervention and epidemiological studies. Other focus areas are health of young populations, to treat overweight, to prevent osteoporosis and postpartum depression observed for women giving birth. Seafood’s importance for consumer behaviour and well-being is assessed to understand determinants of consumers’ seafood consumption and to adapt seafood products to consumer demands. The objectives of the seafood safety component are to make seafood safe for the consumer, by identifying risk factors and avoiding risks caused by viral and bacterial contamination and biogenic amines in seafood. The total value chain is addressed by developing consumer driven tailor-made, functional seafood products to improve health and to ensure nutritional quality and safety by full utilisation of raw materials from aquaculture and from traditional fisheries. The aquaculture component will study the effects of dietary modulation, husbandry, fish physiology, genetics and pre-slaughter conditions. Validated traceability systems are assessed to make it possible to apply a total chain approach from the live fish to the consumer product, and to trace back any feature from fork to farm. Received: January 7, 2008; accepted January 8, 2008     

Granularity and its importance for traceability in a farmed salmon supply chain

Identifying the optimal granularity level of traceable units is necessary when implementing traceability of food. This study examines granularity in a farmed salmon supply chain through the qualitative methods interview, observation, and document analysis. The results show that fish feed and farmed salmon can have fine or coarse granularity of the batches. Fine granularity will give large numbers and smaller batch sizes. Coarse granularity will give fewer numbers and bigger batch sizes. The granularity correlates to different levels depending on the application of information within a company and between companies in supply chains.     

Design of an integrated supply chain model for supporting traceability of dairy products

An efficient traceability system must follow some rules that define which data must be gathered and stored in each stage of the supply chain. This is achieved by data standardization and typification of the messages that enable storing and communication of the data. By establishing and modelling these concepts, we developed a model that supports traceability in the food supply chain. The reference model presented in this paper consists of three distinct phases that represent stages of real-life supply chains, and is the basis for the development of a web application for traceability management in the dairy sector.     

Whole-chain traceability,is it possible to trace your hamburger to a particular steer,a U. S. perspective

Traceability through the entire food supply chain from conception to consumption is a pressing need for the food industry, consumers and government regulators. A robust, whole-chain traceability system is needed that will effectively address food quality, food safety and food defense issues by providing real-time, transparent and reliable information from beef production through slaughter and distribution to the consumer. Traceability is an expanding part of the food safety continuum that minimizes the risk of foodborne diseases, assures quality and cold-chain integrity. Traceability can be a positive competitive marketing edge for beef producers who can verify specific quality attributes such as humane production or grass fed or Certified Organic. In this review we address the benefits as well as the remaining issues for whole-chain traceability in the beef industry, with particular focus on ground beef for the markets in the United States.     

Quality assurance and traceability of foods of animal origin: major findings from the research project IT FoodTrace

Based on the information needs of stakeholders (from animal feed to consumers, including the authorities and organizations involved) an integrated IT-system without structural fractures and barriers shall be developed. It will be designed to enable the merging, internal exchange and utilization of relevant data and parameters. Subprojects of the interdisciplinary research consortium cover the entire supply chain and also address cross-section issues, such as logistics, costs and benefits, veterinarian services, quality assurance systems, a comprehensive IT-solution including data format standards (agroXML), and requirements for sustainability. Substantial added value has been generated from intensive interdisciplinary co-operation. The interdisciplinary research project IT FoodTrace () aims at achieving traceability and quality assurance along the food chain of “meat and meat products”. The aim of this paper is the presentation of (a) the complexity of underlying problems, (b) the project structure, (c) available results from selected sub-projects and (d) the added values from interdisciplinary co-operation. Selected findings include an optimized single animal data collection and information management in livestock systems, benefits gained by linking animal-health-related information to an integrated animal-health system, requirements and features of an integrated IT-System, including consequences for data protection and security, and findings from a Delphi-based cost–benefit-analysis of an integrated quality assurance and traceability system.     

食品供应链中的肉品安全管理——从农场饲养到屠宰环节

我国肉制品质量与安全问题日益突出,如何在供应链的各个环节,采取措施保障肉品安全管理体系,具有现实的意义。构建肉类食品的原料安全生产系统、全面质量管理系统、溯源管理系统等安全保障措施是构成肉类食品安全保障体系的重点。并且本文从提高中国肉类加工食品的市场竞争力出发,针对目前中国肉类加工食品尚未形成完善的供应链管理模式这一现状,提出了在新型的肉类供应链安全管理模型,旨在推进我国肉类工业健康稳步发展。     

How to Determine the Geographical Origin of Seafood?

Traceability of seafood is a much needed service for the seafood industry. Current ways of tracing seafood are minimal while tracing of shellfish is nearly nonexistent. Tracing fish and shellfish are necessary for indicating where the fish and shellfish were fished from, farmed and packed from. This study reviews history of traceability of aquaculture and analytical approaches to verify the origin of seafood. It then describes the new molecular technique of the traceability by using PCR-DGGE to discriminate the geographical origin of fish (cases studies of Pangasius fish from Viet Nam and Sea bass fish from France) by analysis the DNA fragments of microorganisms (bacteria) on fish. This method is based on the assumption that the microbial communities of food are specific to a geographic area.     

The role of smart packaging system in food supply chain

Food supply chain is a rapidly growing integrated sector and covers all the aspects from farm to fork, including manufacturing, packaging, distribution, storing, as well as further processing or cooking for consumption. Along this chain, smart packaging could impact the quality, safety, and sustainability of food. Packaging systems have evolved to be smarter with integration of emerging electronics and wireless communication and cloud data solutions. Although there are many factors causing the loss and waste issues for foods throughout the whole supply chain of food and there have been several articles showing the recent advances and breakthroughs in developing smart packaging systems, this review integrates these conceptual frameworks and technological applications and focuses on how innovative smart packaging solutions are beneficial to the overall quality and safety of food supply by enhancing product traceability and reducing the amount of food loss and waste. We start by introducing the concept of the management for the integrated food supply chain, which is critical in tactical and operational components that can enhance product traceability within the entire chain. Then we highlight the impact of smart packaging in reducing food loss and waste. We summarize the basic information of the common printing techniques for smart packaging system (sensor and indicator). Then, we discuss the potential challenges in the manufacturing and deployment of smart packaging systems, as well as their cost-related drawbacks and further steps in food supply chain.     

基于推广视角的后奥运时代食品供应链可追溯体系框架设计研究

随着编码和信息通信技术的发展,可追溯体系被逐渐应用到食品供应链管理中,以确保食品安全。本文通过建立一般通用的食品可追溯体系框架结构,为北京后奥运时代食品可追溯体系在供应链中的实施和推广提供一种整体分析的方法。