Page 23 - Packaging New magazine Jan-Feb 2023

Traceability pilot marks progress
A year on from the first QR-code enabled table grape traceability pilot, the results speak to its success, reinforced by the news, just announced, that the project has garnered a WorldStar 2023 award for Result Group.
AS INTERNATIONAL GOVERNMENT regu- lations change, food traceability practices are becoming increas- ingly important for export industries.
During the 2022 table grape export season, Agriculture Victoria and the Australian Table Grape Association (ATGA) trialled traceability practices across the table grape supply chain.
“ATGA wanted to conduct this pilot as a test case to see how easily we could embrace end-to-end traceability systems, but also as a way forward for industry,” Jeff Scott, CEO AGTA said.
Industry participants in the project were Perfection Fresh, a large-scale grape producer and exporter, technol- ogy provider Result Group, with global standards backed by GS1 Australia.
Table grapes packaged in three for- mats – naked pack cartons, bunch bags and clamshells – were labelled with a unique serialised QR code enhanced with a GS1 Digital Link, on every unit.
More than 840,000 saleable units were sent to 12 wholesale business-to- business and two business-to-consumer export destinations.
Labelled cartons sent to wholesale customers totalled some 459,121, while retail customers received 192,495 clam- shells and 190,952 bunch bags.
The 14 grape varieties featured tai- lored varietal information on the mobile web app (the microsite), meaning cus- tomers could find out about the variety before they purchased.
FULL TRACEABILITY
Perfection Fresh integrated and implemented end-to-end traceability
procedures, with technology provided by Result Group.
“Result Group’s role was to build a traceability solution that fits with current picking and packing meth- ods for the table grape industry, that was priority number one – no change to current methods,” said Michael Dossor, group general manager, Result Group, and co-chair for GS1 Traceability Solutions.
On the technology front, integration encompassed label design, printers, label codes, GS1 Digital Link, product cloud with GS1 EPCIS protocols, farm software, mobile scanners, temperature tracking, picker data, a microsite with interactive wholesale and consumer interface, dashboard for data access for four farms and head office.
On-farm, Perfection Fresh’s existing systems and harvest data were linked to GS1 standards and export data.
Product labelling with the sophis- ticated QR code allowed for data sharing and data collection, meaning the exporter could manage product well past the loading dock.
DATA DETAIL
The microsite and associated cloud database created to house the infor- mation and link supply chain with
Top: Close on 200,000 bunch bags of table grapes were sent to export markets, each labelled with a unique serialised QR code enhanced with a GS1 Digital Link.
Inset: With a single scan consumers could authenticate the product and find out product information.
consumers and customers allowed for both data sharing and data collection.
Supply chain partners, customers and consumers could use a single scan to verify the product, find out prod- uct information, including variety, harvest data, harvest location, busi- ness information, temperature storage instructions and more. Consumers could also access a feedback tool to pro- vide information to the exporter.
Information was collected in a cloud database, including both on-farm, export traceability data, and scan data.
Producers benefitted from customer and consumer scans by accessing loca- tion scan data, scan numbers, feedback survey data, and access to any fraudulent scan data (none was encountered
during the pilot).
Data privacy is a common
concern when sharing trace- ability information with supply chain partners and consumers.
The data revealed through the microsite was at the discre- tion of the producer/exporter, providing some reassurance that the microsite could be designed to suit the comfort
level of data sharing.
THE WAY FORWARD
As international government regula- tions change, food traceability practices are becoming increasingly important for export industries.
While producer uptake has been low so far, adaptability and scalability of traceability systems is a vital element moving forward.
Dossor said the scalability of technol- ogy was key to “building a solution for the entire industry, large-scale exporter and small grower alike”.
The pilot has demonstrated that it’s important for traceability systems to work seamlessly with producers’ existing pro- cesses. Having the right tools is critical for traceability success. ■
This is an edited version of an article that first appeared in Vine magazine, with content supplied by ATGA.
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