Blockchain and Agriculture
by Adeniyi O. Joy
From the days of tilling the soil with hoe to this day of using machineries, agriculture has
experienced several revolutionaries but still face multiple handles. The non-transparent supply
chain, the inefficient network, unpredictable climates are threats to food security in the globe.
Blockchain and its application offers solutions to the big challenges faced by agriculture.
Block chain offers a lot beyond cryptocurrencies. This technology can rightly transform many
industries and sectors such as Agriculture, banking, law, fashion, music etc.
What is Blockchain?
This is a digital ledger that records verified transactions. It shows the exact start of farms,
inventories, machineries and contracts.
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Why block chain?
1. Traceability
Blockchain enhances producer-consumers trust as consumers can easily track the supply chain
to know who, where and how the food was produced. Transportation details, storage conditions
and expiration date also can be accessed by the consumer. With blockchain, you can trace the
origin of your fruits on your table to know whether they are fit for eating and under what
conditions they were planted
This traceability and access to information makes it easy to know where food gets
contaminated and whether it is organic or chemically raised. Frank Yiannas, former VP of Food
Safety at Walmart said:
“With a blockchain traceability solution you could scan a product and trace that product back
with precision and accuracy to source in seconds – not days or weeks… in the future a
customer could potentially scan a bag of salad and know with certainty whether its been
involved in a recall”.
This also makes it almost impossible to engage in food fraud, false advertisement and food
tampering as foods can be easily traced to their sources.
2. Improved quality and safety of food.
The transparency blockchain provides improves the quality and safety of food in that farmers will
put more effort into every stage and step processes, adequate storage and the freshness of the
food.
3. Availability of Food for the increasing population.
The UN projects that the world's population will reach 9.7 billion by 2050, which will cause
global agricultural production to rise 69% between 2010 and 2050. To cushion this effect,
Blockchain and its application enables farmers to grow more food to feed the growing
population by giving them grounds to access loans. It can provide a decentralized platform that
gives transaction history and a reliable farmer’s identity. The digital information enables farmers
to acquire loans. These loans can be used to modernize their farming thereby increasing
bountiful yields to feed the growing population.
4. Control Weather Crisis
Farmers are confronted with unpredictable weather conditions and crises which threaten food
security. Blockchain ledgers record weather conditions and could be used by farmers to get
crop insurance claims.
A collaboration by Oxfam, Sanasa, Aon, and
Etherisc has started to implement a crop insurance
product to Sri Lankan smallholder in the form of a
blockchain based parametric insurance, triggered
when extreme weather events have scientifically
verifiable impact on crops. This platform uses
blockchain to minimize costs and provide farmers
with better opportunity for access to insurance. The
consortium targets 10,000 farmers in 2020. (Wageningen Research,2019)
5. Fair Payment for Farmers
Block chain increases the payment for farmers by cutting unnecessary intermediaries along the
supply chain who do minimal amounts of work but make a chunk of the profit. . It allows farmers
to connect directly with retailers. Blockchain based smart contracts trigger payment as soon as
the conditions have been met without charging excess transaction fees in opposition to the
usual payment mechanism where it takes weeks for the farmers to receive full payment.
Blockchain is one of the latest and futuristic developments in the field of information and
community technology that can revolutionise our agricultural system.