We thought that blockchain technology might be a good fit for this problem, because of its focus on trust, immutability, and transparency.”īedwell and his team introduced Yiannas to the possibilities of blockchain technologies for enterprise solutions. Karl Bedwell, Senior Director at Walmart Technology, explains, “Creating a (traceability) system for the entire food supply ecosystem has been a challenge for years, and no one had figured it out. When Yiannas first heard about blockchain and the idea of using it to trace food in the supply chain, he was skeptical. Yiannas explains that the company has tried many systems and approaches to solving this problem over the years none had brought them the kind of results they were after. Better traceability could help save lives by allowing companies to act faster and protect the livelihoods of farmers by only discarding produce from the affected farms.įor this reason, Walmart has always been interested in enhancing transparency and traceability in the food system. According to Walmart, millions of bags or heads of lettuce had to be removed, and consumers lost confidence in romaine lettuce altogether. If investigators cannot point to a specific farm or farms, the government usually advises consumers to avoid products grown in a certain area (as happened with romaine lettuce from Yuma, Arizona), or even to avoid the type of product altogether. “But it is not actually a chain, it’s a complex network.” When an outbreak of a food-borne disease does happen, it can take days, if not weeks, to find its source. “People talk about the food supply chain,” says Frank Yiannas, former Vice President of Food Safety at Walmart. Last year in 2018 there were at least 18 reported outbreaks of foodborne illnesses in the USA, including the E. We have access to fresh produce all year round, buy exotic food from all around the world, and have more variety than our ancestors could ever dream of. We rarely think about it, but the modern food system is a marvel.
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