Traceability Ventures and Initiatives

GS1 Standards
The Fresh Produce Industry has adopted the GS1 standards for Numbering and Barcoding of pre packaged goods, non retail trade items and logistics units. In addition GS1 Australia manages on behalf of industry, Price Look Up Codes and a catalogue of National Global Trade Item Numbers (GTIN) for Non Retail Trade Units of Loose Produce.

In early 2014 GS1 are launching the GS1 DataBar which can be scanned by omnidirectional scanners at Point-of-Sale and can be used for hard-to-mark products and GS1 Application Identifiers such as weight, batch number, serial number and expiry are required.

International Federation for Produce Standard
(IFPS) is composed of national produce associations from around the globe. The long term objective of the federation is to improve the supply chain efficiency of the fresh produce industry through developing, implementing and managing harmonized international standards. IFPS was previously known as The International Federation for Produce Coding (IFPC), IFPS is a coalition of fruit and vegetable associations from the around the globe that joined together in 2001 as equal partners to pursue the task of introducing a global standard for the use of international Price Look-Up (PLU) numbers.

The Produce Traceability Initiative,
The PTI is sponsored by Canadian Produce Marketing Association, GS1 US, Produce Marketing Association and United Fresh Produce Association. PTI is designed to help the industry maximize the effectiveness of current traceback procedures, while developing a standardised industry approach to enhance the speed and efficiency of traceability systems for the future.