HAIKOU, November 28. /TASS/. South China's Hainan province has set up a blockchain tracking platform for imported frozen food, reported the regional market regulator.
According to the regulator, a new method of controlling goods has already begun to be used on an experimental basis in large refrigerated warehouses on Hainan with an area of more than 1,000 square meters. "In the future, this method will be applied absolutely in all, even small freezing rooms of the island, where frozen products are stored," said a representative of the department.
Thus, thanks to blockchain technology, the provincial authorities are going to control the entire process of supplying relevant goods from abroad, from the moment of their production to sale to the consumer, including all intermediate stages — purchase, shipment from the warehouse and storage. Each product is provided with a special code by which at any stage it is possible to obtain information about persons, vehicles and outlets that are related to the delivery process. Logging is being conducted by using a special application compatible with WeChat platform.
"This method has many advantages over traditional accounting, when the product is 'manually' assigned a tag", explained a representative of the market regulator. "Now the warehouse workers only need to scan the code using this small program: the optical reader registers the information about products, and about the employee, about their location at the time of the check as well. <...> Moreover, only those who have the right to use them will have access to the data. This eliminates the risk of leakage of commercial information."
Blockchain is a decentralized database, a continuous sequence of interconnected blocks, each of which stores all the information on the chain. They are structured in strict chronological order and are linked by an electronic digital signature, which accompanies any change in the transaction system. This technology allows for faster, cheaper and safer inspection than traditional inspection methods.
Recently, cases of coronavirus detection on packages of products imported into the country from abroad have become more frequent in China. In this regard, the government has tightened control over a number of imported goods, primarily seafood and frozen meat. They are believed to pose the highest risk of infection.