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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

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Blockchain and Tracing Food Sources: Startups are Aiming to Solve the People Problem

Ask most people about blockchain, and they will likely have some familiarity with how the disruptive new technology promises to make traditional paper ledger-based transactions obsolete, replaced by digital ledgers. Headlines abound heralding how blockchain technology will revolutionize financial services markets, which remain burdened by unwieldy paper trails and costly proprietary software applications.

However, not everyone knows that the move toward developing blockchain has direct roots in the erosion of trust that grew as the financial crisis of 2007 and 2008 exploded around the globe. Blockchain allows people to record transactions securely via a decentralized platform without a lot of intermediaries. Because of the advantages it can bring to the process of tracing food sources, it also promises to have a transformative impact on safety and accountability in the food industry.

The evolution of blockchain leads directly back to a crisis of trust, and numerous companies are working on blockchain solutions that will increase trust in the food industry and improve food safety. Katy Jones, CMO of food traceability company FoodLogiQ recently spoke with The Spoon on the topic of California’s tainted Romaine lettuce. “[Blockchain has] potential to be a transformative method to open up transparency in the food supply chain,” she said. However, she also noted that without data built on a common standard and supply chain partners committed to gathering and reporting on that data, blockchain alone will not solve all the issues.

In other words, just as security experts often stress that security is largely a people problem, blockchain’s promise will only be fulfilled if people come together. That’s precisely what some new companies are focusing on. For example, Ecogistix is launching blockchain solutions working directly with farmers to provide the kind of produce traceability that could have cut the California Romaine lettuce disaster at the quick. The solutions provide orderly tracking of inventory, order management and fulfillment.  With them, farmers can track and manage teams that are working in the field and in warehouses so Ecogistix can trace teams that actually packed specific cases. Ecogistix’s technology also meets the Produce Traceability Initiative’s requirements for case and pallet labels that integrate with blockchain.

Consumers are not the only people who stand to benefit. Many blockchain experts agree that farmers have everything to gain by opting in for blockchain solutions. In a recent interview, Sandra Ro, CEO of the Global Blockchain Business Council, said that blockchain technology could put more money in the pockets of farmers while improving the quality of food.

Additionally, standards are emerging for blockchain and food traceability initiatives. The Produce Traceability Initiative (PTI) outlines 7 milestones to implementing case-level electronic traceability in the produce industry. On its website companies can find the tools and resources needed to implement PTI requirements and work successfully with blockchain technology. PTI reports that blockchain traceability and transparency pilots are now underway with Walmart, Kroger, Wegmans, Dole, Driscoll’s and IBM, and “demonstrate the value of whole chain traceability.”

Ripe.io is another company altering the trajectory of the food system through blockchain technology and the Internet of Things. The company’s mission is to “[design] a radically transparent digital food supply chain, [harnessing] quality food data to create the Blockchain of Food – an unprecedented food quality network that maps the food journey to answer what’s in our food, where it comes from, and what has happened to it.” The company is focused on the people problems that need to be solved, and its technology connects food producers, distributors and consumers. With it, farmers can leverage IoT and sensors to automate processes and provide full sourcing accountability.

Just as blockchain itself rose from the ashes of an inflammatory crisis of trust surrounding a global financial crisis, its promise for the food industry is directly tied to getting farmers, retailers, consumers and more groups aligned together. At a 2018 Smart Kitchen Summit panel, executives from ripe.io and Walmart discussed the promise of blockchain in the food industry, food safety, and which groups of people need to get connected for blockchain solutions to work. Watch the video to hear the whole conversation.

After More Romaine Recalls, Is Blockchain the Missing Link in Preventing Outbreaks?

If you have any Romaine lettuce in your crisper, it’s time to chuck it. Yesterday the Center for Disease Control (CDC) announced that romaine lettuce is unsafe to eat in any form due to contamination by a dangerous type of E. Coli bacteria.

The warning throws a large net, covering any lettuce already purchased, or waiting to be bought either wholesale or on supermarket shelves. And with good reason. According to the Washington Post, the CDC doesn’t know where, when, or how the contamination happened. Which means that instead of pinpointing the source(s) of contamination and eliminating lettuce just from those suppliers, they have to play it safe and sentence all Romaine nationwide to the trash bin.

Not only does that ruin a lot of Caesar salads — especially ones destined for the Thanksgiving table — but it also creates a mountain of food waste, and could have wide-reaching effects on produce farmers. This outbreak also comes only a few months after another load of E. Coli-contaminated Romaine (apparently unrelated to the current batch) left 5 dead.

One tool which some think could help solve the problem is blockchain. While blockchain can’t prevent an outbreak from happening, it can help quickly identify the source so that farmers can prevent further contamination. It also allows retailers to take only contaminated products off their shelves, so they aren’t stuck tossing out the baby with the bathwater.

Some companies are already harnessing blockchain to try and increase food traceability. In September, Walmart announced that they would require all its leafy green vegetable suppliers to upload production data to the blockchain through its IBM Food Trust Network. Ripe.io is recently raised $2.4 million to create its “Blockchain for Food,” which allows users to access a detailed record of any food item at any time.

Food traceability company FoodLogiQ is also experimenting with blockchain. In June they launched an R&D hub to explore new technologies in food safety. The first project’s focus: blockchain.

I reached out to FoodLogiQ’s CMO Katy Jones to get her take on the latest Romaine recall. She said that news like this illustrates just how direly we need end-to-end traceability in the food system. And blockchain could play a role in that.

“[Blockchain has] potential to be a transformative method to open up transparency in the food supply chain,” she said.

But it’s not a perfect solution. “Without data built on a common standard and supply chain partners committed to gathering and reporting on that data, blockchain alone will not solve these issues,” concluded Jones. After all, at its core blockchain is just a ledger, which means it’s only as good as the information that humans — who have been known to make mistakes — enter.

The bottom line is that we don’t know how effective blockchain will be in helping to identify and mitigate outbreaks. But we do know that until the majority of farmers, retailers, and everyone in between is united in using the new technology, blockchain won’t be the magic bullet that some hope it to be. Sorry, lettuce lovers.

Food Blockchain: Hype Or True Path To Food Transparency

At a 2018 Smart Kitchen Summit panel, executives from ripe.io and Walmart tackled the role of blockchain in food — and food safety. Watch the video to hear the whole conversation.

FoodLogiQ Announces First Partners for Food Transparency Blockchain Pilot

Earlier today food traceability startup FoodLogiQ revealed the first partners for their upcoming blockchain pilot. According to a press release, they’ll partner with AgBiome Innovations, Subway/Independent Purchasing Cooperative, Testo, and Tyson Foods (the last two of which are also investors in FoodLogiQ) to test the use of blockchain to increase transparency within their supply chains. The pilot is set to kick off later this year.

The company launched FoodLogiQ Labs, an R&D hub for new technologies and products in food safety, earlier last month. Chief Marketing Officer Katy Jones told the Spoon that their first project would be focused on blockchain. This pilot program came a few months after the company raised $19.5 million to intensify and expand their food traceability efforts.

Jones told me that FoodLogiQ’s top priority for the program would be ensuring that their data was standardized and high-quality. “If you don’t have those elements, no amount of transparency will help you,” said Jones. That’s because blockchain is only as strong as its weakest link: if one set of data from the food supply chain is inaccurate — say, the temperature is incorrectly registered for a shipment of chicken — the integrity of the whole thing is compromised. 

She also told me that FoodLogiQ didn’t want to hop on the blockchain bandwagon simply to take advantage of the hype. They’re hoping to use the labs to put together pilots and proof of concepts for blockchain within the food supply chain. But Jones still has some healthy skepticism about this much-heralded technology: “It’s still a relative unknown, especially with regards to food” she said. “And at the end of the day, it may not work for us — that’s the point of doing this R&D work.”

In the same press release, FoodLogiQ CEO Dan said that the company would be “taking the lead on blockchain exploration within the food space.” That may be true — but they’re not the only ones. Other food traceability companies, like Ripe.io and Intelex, are also working to create a blockchain for the food system, as is the Walmart-led Food Trust (which also includes Tyson Foods). The results from FoodLogiQ’s pilot program could indicate whether or not blockchain really has the potential to be a magic bullet for food traceability. 

The Food Tech 25: Twenty Five Companies Changing the Way We Eat

Here at The Spoon, we spend most days writing and thinking about those who are transforming what we eat. No matter whether a startup, big company, inventor, or a cook working on new approaches in the kitchen, we love learning the stories of people changing the future of food. So much so, in fact, that we wanted to share those companies that most excite us with our readers.

And so here it is, The Spoon’s Food Tech 25: Twenty Five Companies Changing the Way We Eat

What exactly is the Food Tech 25? In short, it’s our list of the twenty five companies we think are doing the most interesting things changing the way we create, buy, store, cook and think about food.

As with any list, there are bound to be a few questions about how we got here and why we chose the companies we did. Here are some answers:

How did we create this list?

The editors of the Spoon — myself, Chris Albrecht, Catherine Lamb and Jenn Marston — got together in a room, poured some kombucha (ed note: except for Chris), and listed all the companies we thought were doing interesting and important work in changing food and cooking. From there, we had numerous calls, face-to-face meetings and more glasses of kombucha until we narrowed the list down to those you see here.

Is this an annual list?

No, this is a list of the companies we think are the most interesting people and companies right now, in mid-2018. Things could definitely look different six months from now.

Is this list in a particular order or are the companies ranked?

No, the list is in no particular order and we did not rank the 25 companies.

Why isn’t company X on the list?

If this was your list, company X or Y would most likely be on the list (and that’s ok with us). But this is the Spoon’s list and we’re sticking to it (for now – see above).

And of course, making this list wasn’t easy. There are lots of companies doing interesting things in this space. If we had enough room to create runners-up or honorable mentions, we would. But we don’t (and you don’t have enough time to read a list like that).

So, without further ado, here is the Spoon’s Food Tech 25. If you’re the type that likes your lists all on one page, click here.


EMBER
Ember bills itself as “the world’s first temperature control mug,” which basically means you can dictate a specific temperature for your brew via the corresponding app and keep your coffee (or tea or whatever) hot for as long as you need to. The significance here isn’t so much about coffee as it is about where else we could implement the technology and relatively simple concept powering the Ember mug. The company currently has patents out on other kinds of heated or cooled dishware, and Ember has cited baby bottles and medicine as two areas in which it might apply its technology. And yes, it allows you to finally stop microwaving all that leftover morning coffee.

 


INSTANT POT
The Instant Pot is not the highest-tech gadget around, but its affordability, versatility, and speed have made this new take on the pressure cooker a countertop cooking phenomenon. It also has a large and fanatical community, where enthusiastic users share and reshare their favorite Instant Pot recipes across Facebook groups and online forums. By becoming the first new breakout appliance category of the millennial generation, the Instant Pot has achieved that highly desirable (and rare) position of having its brand synonymous with the name of the category; people don’t go looking for pressure cookers, they go looking for an Instant Pot.

 


DELIVEROO
We chose Deliveroo out of the myriad of food delivery services because of their Editions project, which uses customer data to curate restaurant hubs in areas which have unfulfilled demands for certain chain establishments or cuisine types. This model allows food establishments to set up locations with zero start-up costs, and also gives customers in more restaurant-dry areas a wide variety of delivery food options. Essentially, it’s cloud kitchens meets a food hall, with some heavy analysis to help determine which restaurants or cuisines customers want, and where. These “Rooboxes” (hubs of shipping containers in which the food is prepared) show that Deliveroo is a pioneer in the dark kitchen space, and are doing serious work to shake up the food delivery market.

 

AMAZON GO
There are any number of ways that Amazon could have been included in this list, but its Amazon Go stores are what we think will be the real game changer. The cashierless corner store uses a high-tech combination of cameras and computing power, allowing you to walk in grab what you want — and leave. That’s it. At its first location in Seattle, we were struck by how seamless the experience was. As the locations broaden, this type of quick convenience has the potential to change the way we shop for snacks, (some) groceries and even prepared meal kits.

 


INGEST.AI
Restaurants have more pieces of software to deal with than ever. In addition to all the delivery platforms they are now plugged into, there have to deal with payments systems, HR software, and inventory management software. And right now, none of those applications talk to each other. Created by a former IBM Watson engineer, Ingest.ai promises to extract and connect the data from ALL of those disparate software pieces and tie them together to give restaurant owners a holistic, data-powered view of their business. It also helps them have more precise control over their business and automate tasks like food ordering and staff scheduling.

Want to meet the innovators from the FoodTech 25? Make sure to connect with them at North America’s leading foodtech summit, SKS 2019, on Oct 7-8th in Seattle.

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