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RFID Tags to Track Your Food
Angry_Admin writes "According to the article at IT World Canada, 'Recent food security scares have triggered public outcries and intense concern. People want to know exactly what is in their food, and what is done to it by whom. In response, Canada and many other countries are introducing traceability requirements - records that track all links in the food supply chain, from farmers to processors to retailers to consumers. The Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada agency recently released a policy framework, stating the goal is to make 80 per cent of all food products traceable by 2008.'"
What's missing in this picture is some approach that makes food safe, period. While it's laudable to want to have our long arms of the law around the whole food chain of command, it hardly addresses (in my opinion) real evil, and general detriment to the humanity collective health. There are products and chemicals in food today that for various percentages of the population cause severe side effects, and potentially (probably) are more dangerous than the highly publicized "contamination" food issues.
If you want an example of one good read about just one chemical (MSG, introduced in many nefarious and hidden forms to our foods), read and branch out on this site .
The RFID idea doesn't address:
I see what this article talks about as useful in some sense, but the sum total malaise caused by contamination of our food supply with weird (and to many, unknown) chemicals outpaces, outweighs, and almost trumps the money that would be spent on a massive RFID program.
With all the genetic engineering in our food nowadays... an apple will probably look something like this when traced by RFID
1 Apple= 75% Apple, 10% Orange, 5% Pear, 10% Random Genetic Code
The RFID tags are not going to be in the food you eat, rather they are in the packaging the food comes in. This presents a problem for things like fruit, since now you might only be able to buy fruit and veggies from a store if they are already in a bag, or in a specific bag with the right ID tag.
It is not a ploy to get you to swallow tags so your toilet can analyse your leavings, like in the recent hit movie "The Island".
Canadian ranchers are also working on getting every cow RFID tagged, and testing each one for BSE before it goes to market.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
Well it's not so bad for food. If it was clothing, or books, there are privacy problems definitely--you are going to generally wear clothes a lot, so if there is a db of which you have bought you can be tracked. Same with books, you either buy them or are going to borrow them from the library. However food you are probably going to just take home, and toss the packaging when you're done. What food you eat is already tracked thanks to those loyalty card programs.
Huh? Where are these 'people'? People don't give two craps about anything, let alone where their food has been.
If people really wanted to know what's in their food, chains like McDonalds wouldn't be in business.
The greatest experience we can have is the mysterious.
- Albert Einstein
I should say PER-ITEM RFID is NOT required for tracking. RFIDs are expensive - a few pennies each at best. Printing a serial number on each item can be much much cheaper.
All that is required is a way to track each box or crate from creation to store, and serial number for each package or item.
You put the RFID tags on the pallets or crates (they can be scanned from a distance), and print the lot# and serial# on the box and item. Make the lot# part of the serial# and you have built-in recordkeeping.
For non-packaged foods like fruit, edible ink or stick-on labels are the way to go for the serial numbers.
This may not work well with items like bananas, where the "item" is the bunch but customers routinely split up bunches.
Now all that's required is a way to actually TRACK the items as they leave the store. For items costing more than a few dollars, RFID may be the cheapest way to go. For small items like a stick of gum, it may not be worth tracking. But if it is, scanning a printed serial number is doable, albeit at a non-trivial cost to retailers to replace or upgrade their check-out equipment.
Personally, I think whoever came up with this requirement should do a cost-benefit analysis before mandating it on anyone.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
I think what they are implicitly saying is that "the people that matter" want to know where their food has been. In a democracy, the people that matter are the ones that are willing to get up off their @sses and make their opinions know. The "silent majority" make themselves irrelevant by actively choosing not to participate.
-GameMaster
Rules of Conduct:
#1 - The DM is always right.
#2 - If the DM is wrong, see rule #1
Nutrasweet.
MSG
salts (For those that don't get it, ask a nurse about this old saw "The dose makes the poison". Anything, even the most basic element of life, is deadly in excessive quantities.)
"Preservatives" is a little generic. Even salt in its most basic form is a preservative. Sugar is as well. Liquid maple syrup preserves (get this) hardened maple syrup. So, yeah... hmmm... I'll let you all have at this one.
As far as olestra goes, the results of eating too much (dose makes the poison again) are clearly labelled on the packaging, and apart from being messy, aren't any more dangerous than eating several bowls of all bran.
Did you know that MSG is in breast milk? Yup, in fact, the purpose of MSG is to make food "moreish". This way babies are more inclined to keep drinking mother's milk. I don't see babies suffering from migraines.
Tracking food is very useful when your distribution system is so bad that people are starving because the food isn't making it to market. Talking about the corruption of the food supply is a luxury afforded only to those who have enough food in the first place.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
Why is this a great idea? Man has been eating food since the dawn of time and somehow we've managed to live quite nicely without tracking it from start to finish. If you're that paranoid about your food, put in a garden.
If you don't want crime to pay, let the government run it.
Your problem here is that people are eating primarily processed foods! The easiest way to ensure your diet consists of what you want is to make everything yourself. Start from the simplest blocks you can find that don't contain the ingredients your avoiding and you're all set. You mean that frozen dinner isn't good for me? Shocking! Cooking for yourself is often healthier and cheaper, and I personally find it enjoyable.
Genetically modified foods: traditional cross-breeding/cross-pollinization theory applied with more advanced tools on a wider scope.
Bullshit. No amount of cross-breeding is going to get a plant to express animal genes. So get your dick out of that pumpkin.