One-Up, One-Back ERM in the Food Supply Chain

ABSTRACT

Repeated outbreaks of E. coli and other food poisonings call attention to the need for fast, accurate tracing capabilities to identify sources of contamination and track contaminated foods to their destinations. Concerns about biological agents contaminating food or beverages led to the U.S. Bioterrorism Act of 2002. This Act requires those in the food supply chain to identify the immediate previous source (“one-back”) of all food received and the immediate subsequent recipient (“one-up”) of all food released, but recordkeeping remains seriously inadequate. In this article, we examine the role of radio frequency identification (RFID) in electronic record management (ERM) to improve supply chain operations and responses to public health crises.

KEYWORDS:

• electronic records management
• supply chain
• radio frequency identification

Notes

One-up. For all ingredients received, the processor must be able to identify the disposition of the ingredients in all intermediate and finished products.

One-back. For all products intended for human consumption, the processor must maintain the source identity of all the ingredients contained in that product.