The New York Times reports Walmart’s Veggie-Tracking B.L.T.: Blockchain Lettuce Technology.
When dozens of people across the country got sick from eating contaminated romaine lettuce this spring, Walmart did what many grocers would do: It cleared every shred off its shelves, just to be safe.
Walmart says it now has a better system for pinpointing which batches of leafy green vegetables might be contaminated. After a two–year pilot project, the retailer announced on Monday that it would be using a blockchain, the type of database technology behind Bitcoin, to keep track of every bag of spinach and head of lettuce.
By this time next year, more than 100 farms that supply Walmart with leafy green vegetables will be required to input detailed information about their food into a blockchain database developed by I.B.M. for Walmart and several other retailers exploring similar moves.
The blockchains being tested by companies, including the version adopted by Walmart, generally have nothing to do with Bitcoin or any cryptocurrency — they are entirely new databases with no coins involved. And unlike the Bitcoin blockchain, which can be viewed by anyone, only certain people will be able to view and access the Walmart database.
The system that Walmart is using, IBM Food Trust, has been developed for consumer companies, including Dole, Wegmans and Unilever, to track products moving through the supply chain.
Not a Publicity Stunt
Some think this is a publicity stunt. Unlike Kodak’s ridiculous endeavor to sell mining machines, I don’t.
Blockchain will ultimately have many uses. I’s perfect for recording high-value, low-volume transactions like mortgages and auto loans.
Blockchain will not scale as a means of recording every sales transaction in the world.Even if I am wrong about that, there is no reason to believe Bitcoin itself will survive.
I read time and time again that it was “impossible” to separate blockchain from cryptos.
Excuse me, but it just happened.
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
Thanks for the update on blockchain implementation. I’m Very interested as I see it as part of the machinery of finance very soon also.
Walmart is only interested in eliminating Walmart’s liability. Food contamination needs to be checked at points in the process but it’s impossible to eliminate 100%
Along with KidHorn here, I’m not sure of the value proposition. I can put into the blockchain that I sold 1000 bushels of spinach as “Batch A” from my farm to Global Veggie Conglomerate, Inc.(GVCI) But that doesn’t preclude GVCI from mixing a thousand different batches together and updating the blockchain inappropriately. There’s really not enough data here to know.
My favorite use of blockchain conceptually: property title records. Anything unique could be recorded.
“Blockchain will not scale as a means of recording every sales transaction in the world.”
Blockchain does not need to scale as a means of recording every sales transaction. It can scale to process every transaction in the world by only recording the settling of balances. You should really do your due diligence and learn about the underlying technology before you make yourself look foolish with statements like this.
Seems like overkill to me. What does blockchain provide that simple rows in a database don’t?
Decentralization and immutability
A limited access database would need a central hub to control access . . . and immutability can be assured in a regular database as well
The beauty of the blockchain is that it is not a limited access database and requires no central hub. Immutability can NOT be assured in a regular database because the database owner can always modify the data.
Is security really that important for lettuce? Why not send an email out to all parties whenever a record is inserted or updated?
I don’t think lettuce is a good application for blockchain. I was just commenting on what blockchain provides that simple rows in a database don’t.
When the fate of even a lettuce farmer, owes more to legal mumbo jumbo like being able to prove he is not “discriminated against,” than to simply growing lettuce, otherwise weird “solutions” can suddenly seem sane.
If Walmart wants out of a contract, over contamination, a semi-public, unalterable record gives the ambulance chasers fewer inns, than if they could more easily question the integrity of the data Walmart used to terminate the contract.
I’m just making up an example here. But a distributed, verifiable record of contamination, can serve a similar purpose as the sealed videos cops are recording arrests of minorities (and others) with.
Yep . . . except for more computing overhead.
Oh and an every growing pile of useless data . . . can you delete an entry from a blockchain? OR will every bag have it’s own chain so you can delete the chain say 3 yr after the harvest when the data becomes useless . . .
It provides IBM and Walmart with a sexy press release.