Blockchain is an important way to connect consumers to the food they eat and increase transparency and trust, Kvaroy Arctic CEO Alf-Gøran Knutsen told SeafoodSource.
To that end, the Norwegian farmed salmon producer is partnering with IBM Food Trust to enhance the traceability of its salmon, promote its salmon husbandry practices, and help foster trust across its supply chain.
Kvarøy is using IBM Food Trust’s blockchain-based technology to create a provenance record and is working with its feed supplier BioMar to begin uploading supply chain data to Food Trust, “creating an immutable record of the feed used and the conditions where the salmon was raised, packed, certified and shipped to distributors around the world,” Kvaroy said in a press release.
“Blockchain creates an unchangeable record of the supply chain. This is the highest level of trust and the most reliable means to eliminate fraud, which is important for Kvarøy Arctic because of how much time and investment goes into raising our fish. It also is a benefit to the customer (distributor, retailer, chef, end consumer) because they know where their food is coming from. We can trace it all the way back to the egg,” noted Knutsen, who will be one of the featured speakers on today’s SeafoodSource webinar: “Blockchain for Seafood: Engage the market with data on provenance and sustainability”.
Kvarøy Arctic raises its salmon, which are certified by the Aquaculture Stewardship Council, in open ocean habitats at the Arctic Circle that contain roughly half the population of conventional salmon farms.
Blockchain has the potential to enable greater trust in the supply chain by creating a permanent, digitized chain of transactions that cannot be altered. This way, feed manufacturers, fish farmers, distributors and retailers can all access comprehensive product data in near real-time, the producer said.
“Each member of the chain will download and use an app to scan each salmon lot at each point of receipt. Kvarøy Arctic can grant permission to distributor and retail partners, allowing them to see data about the grade of feed used, the population and density of the habitats the salmon were raised in, their age, harvest date and more,” Kvaroy said.
“With more than 200 organizations participating in Food Trust, our work with Kvarøy Arctic further builds on our progress in promoting transparency and sustainability in the seafood trade,” said IBM Food Trust GM Raj Rao. “From shrimp and scallops to now salmon, Food Trust is delivering the tools needed to collaborate across industries and take the action to preserve and maintain our global fisheries, while protecting the integrity of the seafood supply chains.”
Photo courtesy of Kvaroy Arctic
