Periodic Reporting for period 1 - ALLIANCE (A hoListic framework in the quality Labelled food supply chain systems' management towards enhanced data Integrity and verAcity, interoperability, traNsparenCy, and tracEability)
Berichtszeitraum: 2022-11-01 bis 2024-04-30
Food fraud or economically motivated food adulteration is becoming a significant challenge, with estimated costs on the global economy of $40-50 Billion a year. Current adopted solutions for distinguishing quality-labelled products (PDO, PGI, GI) through food labelling and packaging, providing information about the food product’s identity and contents, and on how to handle, prepare and consume it safely, are proved to be inadequate to safeguard supply chains and protect consumers from mislabeling and tampering of information, as they are limited to track and trace the packaging and not to validate the food product content itself. In addition, quality-labelled food products are more susceptible to fraud as the financial motivation for the fraudsters becomes larger to that type of products. ALLIANCE aims to leverage cutting edge digital technologies with an aim to tackle the food fraud problem in food supply chains within the European Union. ALLIANCE aims to provide a holistic framework that safeguards data integrity and veracity, enhances traceability and transparency and reinforces interoperability in quality labelled supply chain of organic, PDO, PGI, and GI food, through combining innovative technology solutions and validated approaches (such as distributed ledger technologies supported by IoT sensing devices, providing extensible anchors to interoperability protocols and use of portable testing devices to detect adulteration and verify food product claims related to food origin and authenticity) and fosters data-driven decision making through AI and ML for preventative interventions and actionable planning.
ALLIANCE's key offerings include next-gen portable DNA sequencing for verifying the geographic origin of products, advanced spectroscopy for analyzing foods, an AI early warning system for real-time fraud detection, predictive analytics for forecasting risks, and a digital knowledge base for sharing information. Along with the Blockchain which is used to enhance trust and confidence among food value chain stakeholders by providing verifiable and immutable records of transactions, ALLIANCE combines the aforementioned technologies to ensure security, transparency, and traceability and safeguard the veracity of the food product information making the system more transparent and secure. Analytically,
- Portable and cost-effective tools have been developed to fight food adulteration using key authenticity technologies such as qPCR, DNA Sequencing, and NIR & HSI Spectroscopy.
- Harnessing the power of AI and Machine Learning, an Early Warning System (EWS) and an Early Warning and Decision Support System (EWDSS) were developed. These provide food supply chain actors with data-driven recommendations and decision making at the earliest stage possible that aim to mitigate and prevent food fraud incidents.
- The digital knowledge database (KD) has been developed to provide actors of the FSCs and regulatory authorities a way to quickly identify fraud and suggest mitigation strategies.
- A Blockchain solution that aims to safeguard data integrity and utilize trusted sources of information leveraging also portable testing devices to create trust and confidence among the participant actors of the food value chain.
- Portable and cost-effective tools have been developed to fight food adulteration using key authenticity technologies such as qPCR, DNA Sequencing, and NIR & HSI Spectroscopy.
- Harnessing the power of AI and Machine Learning, an Early Warning System (EWS) and an Early Warning and Decision Support System (EWDSS) were developed. These provide food supply chain actors with data-driven recommendations and decision making at the earliest stage possible that aim to mitigate and prevent food fraud incidents.
- The digital knowledge database (KD) has been developed to provide actors of the FSCs and regulatory authorities a way to quickly identify fraud and suggest mitigation strategies.
- A Blockchain solution that aims to safeguard data integrity and utilize trusted sources of information leveraging also portable testing devices to create trust and confidence among the participant actors of the food value chain.
ALLIANCE advances the current state of the art by leveraging emerging technologies like blockchain, AI, and predictive analytics to streamline food value chain processes and ensure the integrity of quality-labeled food products. Establishing a resilient ecosystem for quality-labeled food supply chains requires a holistic framework for early warning and proactive threat identification and management, vulnerability risk assessment, and enhanced data monitoring. The utilization of the blockchain technology in the food supply chains does not only aim to the digital transformation of the chains, but it also is utilized to strengthen the security and trustworthiness of the data exchanged within the platform. Automating data collection and gathering through IoT devices and portable equipment for the instant verification of food product claims, further minimizes the risk of human intervention improving the capability of the system to detect faulty or suspicious products. ALLIANCE offers a track-and-trace enabled mechanism based on the blockchain that increases transparency in organic, PDO, PGI, and GI food supply chains, while meaningful insights and data driven recommendations produced by AI and data analytics, equip food actors, farmers, public authorities, and policymakers with the knowledge to tackle this food fraud problem.