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Application of blockchain technology in sha** the future of food industry based on transparency and consumer trust

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Abstract

Food Industries, at this moment, are moving towards a new phase, and this phase will be governed by consumers and not by the industry leaders. The report shows that claims on sustainability, health, wellness, and transparency would govern the future trends in the food industry. Currently, there are several cases of misleading and false claims which hamper consumer trust. So, to uphold consumer trust, authentication of claims through transparency in the food supply chain is required, and blockchain technology can bring transparency at relatively low transaction costs. Once in a blockchain network, data is very difficult to manipulate, with no single point of authority to mess and collapse the system. Though we see mostly the financial systems using blockchain's decentralized functionality, there is a growing trend of innovative applications being built in the supply chain area for contracts and operations. With effort in the right direction and over time, blockchain will recast how operations and processes are done across the industry, including public sectors. The paper reviews the opportunity for the blockchain in enabling food industries for future-readiness, empowering the consumers in verifying the product claims and thus prevent themselves from food fraud. In doing so, the paper considers the future trends in the food industry, identifies current food fraud cases, and outlines the various applications in the agri-food chain and challenges associated with it.

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Fig. 2

adopted from Kamilaris et al. 2019 and Aung and Chang,2014)

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adopted from NFD 2021)

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge Minal Singhania , BASF SE, Germany, and Prof. Dr. Brijesh Tiwari, Principal Research Officer ,Department of Food Chemistry and Technology, Teagasc Food Research Centre, Ireland, for kind support in proof reading the article.

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Author notes

  1. Vinay Singh

    Present address: BASF SE, Pfalzgrafenstraße 1, 67061, Ludwigshafen am Rhein, Germany

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Business Administration, National Central University, No. 300, Zhongda Road, Zhongli District, Taoyuan City, 320, Taiwan

    Vinay Singh

  2. Chocolate Productivity[AMEA], Mondelez India, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India

    Sanjeev Kumar Sharma

Authors
  1. Vinay Singh
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  2. Sanjeev Kumar Sharma
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Contributions

VS contributed to conception and design, Interpretation of data and wrote the Manuscript; Sanjeev KS contributed to conception, acquisition of data, and corrected the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Vinay Singh.

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We here by declare that the work described has not been published before in any form and it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, its submission to JFST publication has been approved by all authors as well as the responsible authorities—tacitly or explicitly—at the institute where the work has been carried out. If accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or in any other language, including electronically without the written consent of the copyright holder, and JFST will not be held legally responsible should there be any claims for compensation or dispute on authorship.

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Appendices

Appendix A

figure b

Figure: Approach taken for literature review.

Appendix B

Questionaries.

Which of the following you see as the key driver for the success of food industry in future?

  1. 1.

    Variants of the product

  2. 2.

    Going more natural

  3. 3.

    Right claim and transparency

  4. 4.

    Sustainable process and product

  5. 5.

    Healthy and personalized nutrition

Challenges in achieving the future goal

How you perceive following as the challenges for the future of food industry ?

Sematic differential (− 3 to + 3). − 3 as minor challenge, + 3 major challenge.

  1. 1.

    How do you think getting the right raw material as the challenge in future?

  2. 2.

    How do you see food frauds as the challenge for food industry?

  3. 3.

    How do you see building consumer trust as the challenge in future?

Screen capture of Questionaries and response recorded. We have numbered the expert to avoid revealing his personal identity.

figure c

Screen capture of response of some of the experts

Appendix C

figure d

Flowchart showing the approach taken for the review process

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Singh, V., Sharma, S.K. Application of blockchain technology in sha** the future of food industry based on transparency and consumer trust. J Food Sci Technol 60, 1237–1254 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13197-022-05360-0

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