Verifying food credentials

Goal

To develop national provenance infrastructure and techniques to underpin cost-effective and accurate testing of food origin and product attributes. 

This will enable testers to independently verify where and how food was produced, as well as quality, throughout the supply chain. 

Outcome

Our work on provenance and verification will:

• enable independent validation of food origin
• enable verification of supply chain records, supporting food safety responses
• build trust in  the quality and provenance of Australian food
• further grow Australia’s reputation.

The problem

Currently, there are limited ways to identify produce of Australian origin.

This allows for fraudulent activity. For example, opportunities for substitution, dilution or misrepresentation at many points along the supply chain.

Inability to confirm that a physical product is irrefutably consistent with its supply chain documentation, also compromises regulators ability to respond to food safety incidents.

Lack of assurances around quality or other product attributes also diminishes consumer trust.

Our proposed solution

Food provenance infrastructure

We are developing national provenance infrastructure to integrate data needed to verify place and method of production from a physical sample of a food product.

It will serve as a confidential digital repository across the supply chain, enabling validation at a lower cost and with a greater range of origin identification methods, including isotopic fingerprints.

Predicting place of production

We are using the environmental markers from soil and water to create isotopic fingerprints that are unique to an agricultural region and can be used to verify claims about provenance, sustainability and production methods.

This will help respond to fraud and biosecurity concerns and increase consumer trust.

Traceability sensors 

We are developing real-time and potentially autonomous sensor-based systems, such as our REIMS technology platform, for use on farms and in food processing facilities.

These sensors will be able to verify product attributes objectively and accurately such as origin, production method and quality throughout the supply chain.

Partners

The Trusted Agrifood Exports Mission is a partnership between CSIRO, the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, and Meat & Livestock Australia to digitally transform Australia's agrifood supply chain and grow export premiums across commodities.

We are also working with collaborators across industry, the research sector and government on key projects to reach our goal.