The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that it published its first video in an educational series focused on how food companies’ use of tech-enabled traceability can enhance food safety and protect consumers from foodborne illness. 

The agency said that the first episode of the series focuses on supply chain technology, building on key themes from the 2021 FDA New Era of Smarter Food Safety Low- or No-Cost Tech-Enabled Traceability Challenge.  

In the episode, five participating companies demonstrate various approaches to low- or no-cost traceability technologies within diverse parts of the food supply chain. The FDA states that the video showcases how the food industry can help create a more digital, efficient and safe food system that will benefit both consumers and food producers.  

The roundtable participants discuss opportunities for firms to voluntarily adopt tracing technologies, harmonize tracing activities, and ways to incentivize the development and implementation of scalable and cost-effective traceability hardware, software or data analytics platforms.  

The video is intended as a resource for food producers, technology providers and other stakeholders interested in advancing food traceability concepts and supporting efforts to achieve end-to-end traceability throughout the food safety system, at low- or no-cost to the end user, as outlined in the FDA’s New Era of Smarter Food Safety blueprint.  

Foodservice sales in convenience stores are about 26% of in-store sales, a category that continues to be a key focus area for retailers.  For more on food safety in the convenience industry, check out “Food Safety is a Shared Responsibility” in the January 2024 issue of NACS Magazine. 

NACS Daily covered the new traceability rules in November.