FoodAuthent
A system for checking the authenticity and origin of food through its chemical fingerprint.
The project
The longer and more branched supply chains become, the more easily the authenticity and labelling of food slip out of control, through counterfeiting, false declarations of origin or misleading labelling.
FoodAuthent developed a non-targeted testing approach for this. The chemical fingerprint of a sample is captured and then compared against authentic reference samples. That makes it possible to identify origin, variety and adulteration, including cases not seen before.
The project demonstrated feasibility for three product groups: hard cheese, edible oil and spirits. The result was the open system fAuthent, which brings together fingerprinting databases, analytical methods and accompanying product information. Every partner involved keeps control over its own data. The results were presented in Berlin in November 2019.
The contribution from benelog
Within the consortium we were responsible for the data platform, the technical foundation of the fAuthent system. The task was demanding. Analysis results from various laboratories, product-accompanying information and evaluation methods had to come together between independent partners, and each partner was to keep full control over their own data.
The project therefore deliberately chose a distributed architecture. Central databases and merely passing information along no longer meet the requirements for real-time capability, scalability and data sovereignty. The distributed solution is based on GS1 EPCIS, the established standard for the event-based exchange of supply chain data.
The project produced the first concepts and technical solutions for exchanging product-specific analysis data on the basis of EPCIS as well. That made EPCIS usable for fingerprint data beyond classic traceability. For the large and fast-growing volumes of data we used NoSQL databases, and we took part in designing the Discovery Service, which makes data findable while securing access rights along the chain of custody.
The interfaces of the platform were documented openly and implemented in conformance with the standard.
More about the project
