Two European Salmon Producers Use IBM’s Blockchain Platform to Track Supply Chain

Salmon farming company Cermaq and smoked salmon producer Labeyrie began using IBM’s cloud blockchain technology to trace their product supply chains.

Cermaq announced the development in a Nov. 20 press release, revealing that it cooperated with Labeyrie and IBM’s blockchain platform IBM Food Trust to enable customers to get information about the salmon value chain. All Cermaq salmon products now come with a CV and QR-code, so consumers can check details such as:

“... [fish] origin, when it was hatched, which fresh water facility it came from, how big it was when it was transferred to seawater, at which sea water facility it has been farmed, as well as health and welfare information such as which vaccinations it has received, what it has been fed, and when it was harvested.”

Labeyrie rolled out a traceability system for two of its Norwegian smoked salmon products, thus allowing consumers to see information about the whole production chain of the fish — from egg to store. Commenting on the development, Brede Løfsgaard, sales director in Cermaq Norway, said that the project was partly driven by customer demand for more transparency.

Putting food on the blockchain

Food manufacturers around the world have been actively integrating blockchain technology into their supply chains. Earlier in November, retail giants Carrefour and Nestlé began deploying IBM’s Food Trust blockchain platform to track the supply chain of milk-based formula for infants. The firms aim to advance consumer confidence in the products’ quality by ensuring more transparency of the supply chain of formulas produced by Laboratoires Guigoz.

American logistics giant UPS successfully delivered a blockchain-verified beef shipment from the United States to Japan. The company had partnered with agritech firm HerdX to incorporate its packaging technology into a blockchain network to trace the journey of beef from Kansas to Japan.