1. CGCSA Summit
Panel Discussion: Food Safety in the Digital Era - Ensure Track & Trace
Diane Taillard, Johannesburg, South Africa
14 November 2018
Awareness Messaging for Users
General note: “Traceability” could be presented as “traceability, transparency and visibility” depending on the market.

2. GS1 Standards GS1 provides the common language for business.
GS1 provides the common language for traceability solutions.
GS1 enables the traceability ecosystem.

3. For an effective use of technologies across traceability applications.
Narrative (short)
Businesses use traceability for different needs. The latest technologies co-exist with legacy systems. It is critical not to have different languages but one common language for all applications. Owing to a robust user-driven standardisation process, GS1 consistently supports all traceability applications as they emerge, whatever the technology. Moreover, the standardisation of the data semantic (or meaning of the data) enables an effective use of technologies.
Note to the presenter: This slide or its explanation should be tailored depending on the business needs and technology background of the audience. See also slides about business needs from CPG, Fresh foods, Foodservice.
Narrative (optional for longer explanation)
Needs evolve over time depending on the latest food crisis, market’s demand, regulations… GS1 enables companies to use the same information for all potentially related applications such as:
• recall readiness
• regulatory requirements
• logistic efficiency
• risks management of procurements
• optimisation of the production
• fighting counterfeiting
• food safety certification
• transparency on the origin, ethical and environmental aspects for consumers
• ….
Technologies also evolve over time. Some even wrongly pretend that the use of the latest hot technology (blockchain) will solve it all. But without GS1, these would be technics without data. GS1 brings the portability of the data, whatever the technology, if the data is shared in a standardised way.

4. GS1 recognitions and collaborations

5. Testimonial
“Consumers are demanding more transparency. They want to know where ingredients come from. We have to organise ourselves as an industry and work hand in hand, including with GS1, to tackle this challenge.”
Anita Scholte op Reimer Senior Director Quality Assurance & Product Sustainability, Albert Heijn, GFSI Board Vice-Chair
Source : GS1 Annual report 15-16