How Blockchain Can Transform Grocery Industry Logistics

For grocery operations, logistics represents a major portion of product cost. Given the industry’s small margins and high volume, any savings can add significantly to a company’s bottom line. But logistics is a highly complex system that has evolved from a linear process to what Deloitte calls the “digital supply network,” a dynamic web capable of adapting to shifting supply and demand scenarios for maximum efficiency and value.  This is the second blog post in a two part series where we interview Nikhil Vadgama, a Research Fellow of the University Centre London Centre for Blockchain Technologies (CBT.)  Part one of this series was titled "How Blockchain Can Transform Consumer Products."

Blockchain, particularly when paired with Internet of Things (IoT) technology, seems to be an ideal solution to the challenges that can hinder food supply chains with waste and delay. Here are just a few ways in which these technologies can work in tandem to transform the food supply chain as we know it.

Assuring product quality.

Consider the case of fresh or frozen food that’s highly susceptible to damage by fluctuations in temperature and humidity. Current practice typically relies on trusted partners checking cargo along the way to ensure consistent environmental factors, but this is an inefficient process that’s difficult to scale. By contrast, IoT sensors can accompany a product throughout its journey from origin to shelf, recording any deviation from the required conditions onto the blockchain for all stakeholders to see.

This is already happening in the pharmaceuticals industry in a way that could easily translate for food distribution for building more reliable and resilient cold chains—where cold chain tracking can provide useful metrics for blockchain transparency and tracing. The MediLedger Project, launched by Chronicled in 2017, validates each transaction in the supply chain onto the blockchain, with the provenance of each item verified at every step. In addition, it enables automated business actions based on IoT monitored conditions. The system also includes what the company calls “CryptoSeals,” which are tamper-evident package seals with Near Field Communication (NFC) chips embedded with unique identity information, which is immutably registered and verified on a blockchain.

We hope you havefound this article informative and interesting. For more information or queriescontact us to know more about this technology.