Part VI: Report on IDTechEx Food Traceability 2006
Mar 02, 2006
Unique signatures an alternative to RFID?
Thirty years ago a company Copytex in Germany tried to exploit the fact that all paper is unique in the distribution and orientation of its fibres, this giving a "unique signature" for anti-counterfeiting. Frankly, the technology was not up to the task and the company vanished. In his talk "Natural Randomness as a Fingerprint: Using Nanotechnology to Fight Counterfeiting and Provide Secure Asset Tracking Through the Supply Chain",
Mark McGlade, Director of Business Development, of UK startup Ingenia Technology Limited described how the problem is now cracked using lasers. This, he feels, gives an alternative to tracking technologies such as RFID not just a new and improved tool for anti-counterfeiting.
He covered the authenticating of packaging etc structures. He described how his new Laser Surface Authentication system LSA TM can rapidly analyse the surface of any item (paper, plastics metal or ceramics) and create a unique digital serial code without the need to tag or barcode and the many benefits and applications for secure packaging of such a naturally-occurring 'fingerprint'
Dr. Betsy Moran, Technical Marketing Manager, Business Development, BioScience of sponsor Whatman Inc, USA explored technologies used in DNA analysis, uses of DNA in livestock tracking, how DNA can be used to track meat through processing and using DNA to safeguard current traceability practices
"The Identification of Animal Species in Food : An Example of the Application of the DNA Chip Technology" was covered by Olivier Pasquier, Global Product Manager - Molecular Biology, bioMérieux Industry, France/USA including:
- DNAchips revolution. The analysis of food by asking open questions
- Traceability and authentification applications
- FoodExpert-ID : an Identity card for food authenticity
On the aspect of temperature recording, we heard of "1 to 3 Penny Thermal, Transinformative Time and Temperature Barcodes" now achieving commercial success. These basically change colour so they will not scan if they and therefore the product they are on, has been overheated. In this respect, Randal P Thompson of SIRA Technologies delved into
- Industry and consumers partnering for safety and profit
- Barcodes that use irreversible printing ink to sense time and temperature abuse
- Global monitoring and reporting through archival barcodes
- Complete cold chain management for rapid gate-to-plate delivery of safe product and interdiction of time and/or temperature-abused product
- Two continent collaboration for break-through system
Ad hoc networks of active RFID?
"Remote Asset Tracking, Monitoring and Control Solutions for the Supply / Cold Chain" was the hook for a controversial talk by the much respected technical guru Axel Striefler, President, CEO, Syscan International, Canada. Today's problems of transparency and accountability within Supply / Cold Chain included the manual nature of putting temperature recorders in cargo, manually reading them and later taking them out. He believes that this will preclude them from ever being used in millions whether they are Smart Active labels or not. He looked at applications, methods and types of tracking within supply / cold chain and concluded that RFID where tags talk to tags is the answer - ad hoc networks what make a lot of short ranges into a long range using his specially developed active RFID Time Temperature Recorders. Others such as Maxim Dallas Semiconductor (product launch in October) and RFSAW are in agreement on the need for longer range and thus better automation of TTR use but they seek to do it in a different way.
Axel talks of integrated web-based control solutions using RFID and M2M technology creating real value for all channel partners in form of idealized risk mitigation and profitability.
Livestock in New Zealand
Livestock Traceability in New Zealand is only beginning to employ RFID and HF is preferred because ear tags made this way eg by Infineon spinoff Primary link in Australia are cheaper (about US$1.5), have read write and multi-tag reading eg for prancing deer.
Sharl Liebergreen, Consultant, Abacus Biotech, New Zealand lucidly spelt this out while acknowledging that traceability in New Zealand is only a secondary driver at present. He covered the role of distributed data in traceability and standards conundrums.
"Biometric Identification of Livestock to Support Contract and Regulatory Requirements for Traceability" was the final presentation by Dr Bruce L. Golden, CEO, Optibrand Ltd, LLC, USA including coverage of:
- The need for biometric identification of food animals in traceability programs
- Performance of biometric identification methods
- Costs and benefits of retinal identification combined with GPS
- Current applications of retinal identification around the world
The IDTechEx conference Food Traceability 2006, held on February 1-2 2006 in Dallas, USA, was a great success with attendance from 13 countries. There was a consensus that track, trace and identify are merging as both sciences and needs. Requirements and executions before and after the farm gate are also becoming seamless. These barriers are rapidly breaking down. New sources of data such as RFID, 2D barcodes and widespread DNA analysis are creating a challenge in the sheer volume of data generated. www.trackingfood.com 
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