A pragmatic approach to traceability in food supply chains

Traceability systems have become vital within business organizations in enhancing the reliability of products while facilitating the management of the supply chains and production processes efficiently. Despite the potential of traceability systems to reap multifaceted benefits, most industries do not still feel traceability systems as a catalyst for financial gains, thus limit its use for facilitating compliance with mere legal requirements. Moreover, the practical deployment of tractability systems in complex supply chains and production processes remain a challenge due to several issues such as lack of cost effectiveness, incompatible production system, and inadequate technological knowledge of the staff. In this paper, we introduce a traceability system, by integrating internal and chain traceability features together with backward and forward traceability functionalities, which deliver higher cost effectiveness, accuracy, user friendliness and security. The system specially targets food supply chains in Japan with special focus to Small and Medium Size Enterprises.