Chain Business Insights
  • Home
    • About Us >
      • Sherree DeCovny
      • Ken Cottrill
    • Custom Research
  • Our Research
    • Smart Contracts in Supply Chain
    • Blockchain and the Future of Food
    • Blockchain in Trade Finance
    • Surveys
    • eBook Series
    • Blockchain Meets Supply Chain >
      • Purchase eBook
    • Blockchain in Smallholder Farming >
      • Purchase eBook
    • Blockchain and the Future of Food eBook >
      • Purchase eBook
    • Blockchain in Legal Cannabis >
      • Purchase eBook
  • Insights Blog
    • Chain Reactions Podcast
  • In the News
    • Our News
  • Contact
Continuous Intelligence for Blockchain-Enabled Supply Chains
Picture

RSS Feed

Can Blockchain Fix Chipotle’s Supply Chain Woes?

7/24/2017

0 Comments

 
By Ken Cottrill, Co-Founder and Research Principal ​​​
Picture
​Restaurant chain Chipotle is making the wrong kind of news again, with reports that the company temporarily closed a restaurant in Virginia after 13 customers became ill with symptoms that are consistent with food poisoning.
 
Can blockchain technology address the food safety issues that have eroded Chipotle’s brand and reflect wider industry concerns?
 
A new research brief from Chain Business Insights LLC titled Blockchain and the Future of Food: Driving Efficiency, Transparency and Trust in Food Supply Chains suggests that the answer is yes – with some important caveats.
 
Wider problems
 
Chipotle has been trying to recover from food poisoning scandals since 2015. It has instituted more stringent food safety procedures after a detailed examination of its supply chain. This latest setback is a reminder that despite the company’s best efforts, its supply chain is still vulnerable to product spoilage. Shares dropped 4% immediately after the incident in Virginia.

​But Chipotle’s struggles are by no means unique. As the Chain Business Insights research brief explains, the food service supply chain is extremely complicated. Food manufacturers, brokers, distributors and third-party logistics providers are some of the entities that have a hand in delivering the dishes that restaurant customers consume. Along the way, silo-related information gaps and a lack of trust create opportunities for the kinds of disruptions that have Chipotle on the rack.
 
Another real-life example of a food poisoning outbreak in the research brief illustrates how supply chain complexity makes it difficult to combat the industry’s safety challenges.
 
In June 2016, an outbreak of food poisoning occurred across nine U.S. states involving 32 patients. The outbreak strain of bacteria was isolated from imported Anaheim pepper. An investigation by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) revealed that fresh hot peppers were the likely source of infection, but a single pepper type or source farm could not be isolated. Even though the CDC was armed with advanced detection techniques such as genetic testing, it could not pinpoint where the infection entered the supply chain. The complexity of the pepper supply chain was one factor. There are numerous growers and the product is consolidated before it gets to retail outlets. Consumers could only provide limited information because they were unsure what an Anaheim pepper looks like. Moreover, peppers are an ingredient for prepared dishes, and the epidemiologic investigation had to rely on a review of restaurant-specific recipes to help track where the peppers were used.
 
Help on the way
 
Blockchain technology appears to be tailor-made for solving many of these issues. It provides a tamper-proof, up-to-date database of transactions that is available to all verified users. Such a database is a powerful tool for tracking chain of custody right down to the item level.
 
Work is underway to develop such applications. The Chain Business Insights brief details a number of these projects. Vendors are developing blockchain applications in key areas such as supply chain traceability and trade facilitation, and much of this work is likely to come to fruition over the next year.
 
However, as the brief explains, the widespread adoption of blockchain in the food industry is further away for assorted reasons.
 
One is the challenge of integrating blockchain into the industry’s myriad information systems. A lack of communications standards doesn’t help either.
 
Still, these hurdles are surmountable. The research brief concludes that given the immense potential for blockchain-based applications in the food supply chain, “it’s not a question of whether they will be implemented – but when.”
 
Hopefully, this message offers encouragement for scandal-prone food service companies such as Chipotle. 
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Picture

    Ken Cottrill

    View my profile on LinkedIn
    Picture


    ​Sherree Decovny

    View my profile on LinkedIn

    Archives

    August 2019
    July 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    August 2018
    June 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017

    Categories

    All
    Blockchain Fundamentals
    Use Cases
    Vendor Focus

    RSS Feed


Copyright © Chain Business Insights, LLC  2020

  • Home
    • About Us >
      • Sherree DeCovny
      • Ken Cottrill
    • Custom Research
  • Our Research
    • Smart Contracts in Supply Chain
    • Blockchain and the Future of Food
    • Blockchain in Trade Finance
    • Surveys
    • eBook Series
    • Blockchain Meets Supply Chain >
      • Purchase eBook
    • Blockchain in Smallholder Farming >
      • Purchase eBook
    • Blockchain and the Future of Food eBook >
      • Purchase eBook
    • Blockchain in Legal Cannabis >
      • Purchase eBook
  • Insights Blog
    • Chain Reactions Podcast
  • In the News
    • Our News
  • Contact