Northwest Food Industry Examines RFID's Potential

"I wanted to see if we can provide the kind of leadership that is needed to get this started between RFID vendors and the Northwest food industry," Ling says. The workshop was a collaborative effort between OSU, the NWFPA and the Oregon Department of Agriculture.

Members attended the RFID session with questions regarding how the seafood industry could employ radio frequency identification to track the harvesting, processing and distribution of fish—as well as how the produce industry could track apples and other products from farm to store, using solutions combining RFID and GPS technologies. Because the food they supply contains a great deal of water—which can interfere with RF signals—NWFPA members expressed concern regarding read rates, including how to accomplish a read of tags on crates in the middle of a pallet.

OSU professor Qingyue Ling

During the NW Food Manufacturing & Packaging Expo, John Ryan, administrator for the Hawaii State Department of Agriculture, updated the group regarding the state agency's RFID program in which the produce supply chain uses RFID-tagged containers to provide visibility of produce as it is shipped from the state's 600 farms to stores and restaurants (see Hawaii Plans Traceback Program for Fresh Food). According to Ryan, the state has entered phase two of the project, in which members will test a recall event; during this phase, the agency will attempt to identify the source of a specific piece of produce, as well as the batch from which it came (such as would be necessary in a recall) and where other produce from that batch might be located. With phase two, the agency is also launching a Hawaii Food Safety Center Web site, at which consumers can learn how the state is using RFID to ensure the safety and authenticity of Hawaiian food, and at which supply chain participants—whether growers, logistics companies or retailers—can advertise their products and services, as well as share data about produce shipments.

As part of the food-visibility project's second phase, Ryan says, participants will test sensors that could be wired to RFID tags, to transmit temperature data regarding produce as it is being shipped. Among the wireless sensor networking products being considered for testing are those manufactured by Crossbow Technology and Infratab.

Other speakers at the workshop included Magalie Laniel, a researcher and graduate student at the University of Florida's Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering, who described a strawberry-tracking pilot in which the use of RFID and temperature sensors increased the profit for a trailer's worth of strawberries by approximately $13,000, by tracking per trailer. Bill McBeath, chief research officer of ChainLink Research outlined several different traceability systems, such as grain supply chain tracking, that can ensure, for instance, that organic ingredients are separated from non-organic.

According to Kirby, attendees told her they were pleased with the workshop's content, and that they gained greater understanding of RFID's role not only in traceability but also in improving efficiency in food processing and logistics. "The traceability part, I believe, was expected, but they appreciated the efficiency and productivity benefits they could gain," she says. These included improved inventory management and product movement within a warehouse.

At this point, Kirby says, the NWFPA has not yet decided whether it will offer RFID workshops at its future expos. "We need to wait and see," she states, adding that she expects her organization's members will express opinions regarding the matter in the coming months.