TRACEABILITY
Advancements in barcode technology are helping curb food counterfeiting Counterfeit food has been a thorn in the side of the food and beverage industry for some time, but GS1 Australia is stepping up to help combat the problem. Adam McCleery explains.
I
ssues around counterfeit food are of growing concern to the food and beverage industry, but advancements in traceability technology are helping to combat this troublesome area. There are two main types of counterfeits in the food sector. First, food fraud, falsification and adulteration, which refers to products made from ingredients that are not of the quality claimed by the manufacturer. Second is the falsification of a brand, protected geographical indication (PGI) or denomination of origin (PDO), which relates to falsified data either on the food or the packaging itself. Peter Carter is the director of Business Development and Innovation at GS1 Australia, a not-for-profit organisation that specialises in developing and maintaining standards for barcodes and traceability. He said the company has developed methods for the industry to track products more accurately and, by extension, mitigate the risk of counterfeiting. “GS1 is stepping up to the plate on this with the introduction of nextgeneration barcodes, like 2D and QR barcodes. GS1 has also introduced new global services around verification,” he said. Two-dimensional (2D) barcodes, unlike their predecessors, can hold more information about the product inside the packaging. QR codes are another version of machine-readable barcodes that can retain a host of information for the consumer, who can scan them with a smartphone. Carter said too many myths revolved around 2D and QR codes; myths he hoped, would be squashed as the
Advancements in barcode technology would help mitigate the rise of counterfeit food.
technology becomes more prolific. “One of the things that we often hear from various angles is that QR codes aren’t safe, and I’d like to kill that myth,” said Carter. “The fact that so many people carry mobile phones now, and QR codes have been so widely accepted, particularly in our major markets in Southeast Asia, is a good sign.” Carter said a key driver behind the adoption of new barcode technology was a trade-off between cost, speed, and effectiveness. “We’ve found that putting identifiers on the product, we have been doing that for 50 years now, is the foundation to provide global traceability and to increasingly tackle issues around fraud and misrepresentation,” said Carter. “As the issue grows globally there’s more sophistication needed
32 Food&Beverage Industry News | February 2022 | www.foodmag.com.au
to combat the issues, particular around organised crime. There are more sophisticated methods for identification of batches and to be sure about the country of origin.” GS1 is uniquely positioned to support the industry with all the features of 2D and QR codes as a means of protecting product and brand quality. “GS1 has a huge role to assist the industry in delivering information directly to the customer and that’s what these 2D codes are making possible and there’s a real transformation occurring,” said Carter. “Customers want and expect this sort of information, but we need to make sure that the brand owners have control of what is delivered to the customer. “There are a lot of parties
sitting in between and brokering information, and there is enormous potential for counterfeiting of information and distorting the facts when they don’t come directly from the brand owner.” In some cases, the distortion of facts is mild, while at other times the distortion can be more sophisticated and damaging. “If there is a high-cost ingredient, let’s say muesli, the packaging might mention blueberries and the customer thinks they are fresh, but the blueberries could be frozen or not natural,” said Carter. “There’s a spectrum of severity and it’s typically done with no regard for quality or safety.” Public safety, even more than brand reputation, is another key driver behind the renewed push to stamp out counterfeit food, according
