Application Analysis of RFID Technology in Food Industry 2020-06-10

Application Analysis of RFID Technology in Food Industry

Radiofrequency identification technology (Radio Frequency Identification RFID) is a non-contact automatic identification technology, which automatically identifies target objects and obtains relevant data through radio frequency signals without manual intervention. Compared with traditional automatic identification technologies such as bar codes, magnetic stripes, magnetic cards, and IC cards, RFID technology has the advantages of high automation, long recognition distance, a large amount of stored information, and strong environmental adaptability. Moreover, RFID technology has achieved passive and Contact-free operation, convenient application, no mechanical wear, long life, can better ensure the safety of appliances. If you are interested in eron intelligent technology co., LTD products or want to know more information, please contact us (contact information at the bottom of the article).

1 RFID technology and principle
The RFID system must have two key capabilities, the first is automatic identification, data reading, and writing capabilities; the second is the data processing capabilities that can meet data storage and data conversion. The general  RFID system consists of the following 3 basic components:

1.1 Electronic label
Generally composed of chips and coupling components, the main function is to complete the communication with the reader/writer. Compared with bar code, magnetic card, IC card, and other early or early identification technologies, radio frequency identification cards have the advantages of non-contact, long working distance, suitable for harsh environment, and recognizable moving targets.
According to different energy supply methods, RFID tags can be divided into passive tags, semi-active tags, and active tags. The energy of the chips in the semi-active tags and active tags is provided by the battery attached to the electronic tag. The active tags can actively send out radio frequency signals. According to the different operating frequencies, RFID tags can be divided into the microwave, ultra-high frequency (UFH), high frequency (HF) and low frequency (LF) and other different types. The working principle of RFID in different frequency bands is different. The RFID of microwave and ultra-high frequency band generally adopts the principle of electromagnetic emission, and the RFID electronic tags of high frequency and low-frequency band generally adopt the principle of electromagnetic coupling.
1.2 Reader
The reader is a device for reading tag information. The RFID reader is to control the radio frequency module to transmit a read signal to the tag, and receive the tag's response, decode the tag's object identification information, and transmit the object identification information along with other relevant information on the tag to the host for processing.
In most RFID systems, the reader emits electromagnetic waves in an area (the size of the area depends on the operating frequency and antenna size). There is an LC series resonance circuit in the card, the frequency is the same as the frequency emitted by the reader. When the radio frequency card passes through this area, under the excitation of electromagnetic waves, the LC resonant circuit resonates, so that there is a charge in the capacitor. At the other end of this capacitor, a unidirectional channel electronic pump is connected to send the charge in the capacitor to another capacitor for storage. When the accumulated charge reaches 2V, this capacitor can be used as a power supply to provide operating voltage for other circuits, to send out the data in the card, or to access the data of the reader. After the reader receives the data from the card, it decodes and performs error checking to determine the validity of the data, and then transmits the data to the computer network via RS232, RS422, RS485 or wireless. A simple RFID product is a non-contact IC card, while a complex RFID product can be connected to an external sensor interface to measure and record different parameters, and can even be connected to a GP S system to track objects.
1.3 Data exchange and management system
The reader sends a certain frequency of radio frequency signals. When the radio frequency card enters the working area of the transmitting antenna, an induced current is generated. The radiofrequency card obtains energy and is activated. The radiofrequency card sends its code and other information through the built-in card. The system receiving antenna receives the radio frequency The carrier signal sent by the card is transferred to the reader through the regulator. The reader demodulates and decodes the received signal, and then sends it to the background main system for related processing. The main system judges the legality of the card according to the logical operation, Makes corresponding processing and control for different settings, issue command signals to control the action of the actuator.
Radiofrequency identification technology uses the transmission characteristics of radio frequency signals and spatial coupling to realize the automatic identification of the identified objects. The radio frequency identification system is composed of three parts: reader (reader, reader, reader), electronic tag (Tag), and data exchange and management system. The principle of radio frequency identification technology is: the reader generates an energy field within the readable range to stimulate the electronic tag. When the food with the electronic tag enters this distance range, the reader will control to emit a microwave query signal, and After receiving the signal from the reader, the electronic tag integrates the signal with the data information in the tag and reflects it to the reader. The reflected microwave synthesized signal already carries the data information on the electronic tag. The reader receives the microwave reflected by the tag. After the signal is processed by the internal microprocessor of the reader, the information stored in the tag can be readout.

2 Application of radio frequency identification technology in food
As people's awareness of food safety has increased, government departments have paid more attention to food safety, and the news media's exposure to safety incidents has made food safety issues increasingly serious. Food is directly related to people's health. In addition to establishing a series of national and industry standards to regulate food production, processing and sales, high-tech methods are also required to manage food safety. eron intelligent technology co., LTD applying RFID technology to the food industry can effectively ensure the real-time and accuracy of information collection, improve the level of food safety and monitoring management, coordinate all aspects of the food chain, and increase people’s understanding of food. Transparency ensures the safety of food. The application of RFID technology in the food industry mainly has the following aspects:
2.1 Application of RFID technology in food anti-counterfeiting
Due to the current imperfect legal system in China and the unregulated market, some criminals at home and abroad, for profiteering, especially counterfeit well-known products, substituting good products with false ones, forming a certain market for counterfeit and shoddy goods, and seriously disrupting the social market economic order. Most of the fake and inferior foods are famous wines, health products, and famous special products. eron intelligent technology co., LTD uses RFID radio frequency identification technology for anti-counterfeiting. Compared with other anti-counterfeiting technologies such as digital anti-counterfeiting and laser anti-counterfeiting technologies, the advantage of RFID is that each tag has a globally unique ID number and cannot be modified. Imitation; no mechanical wear, anti-magnetic, anti-fouling and waterproof; RFID reader has a physical interface that is not directly open to the end-user to ensure its security; there is a mutual authentication process between the reader and the tag; And RFID can withstand high temperature, long service life, and relatively large storage capacity; tags are easily integrated into various products, which can greatly increase the difficulty and cost of counterfeiting.
In California, the United States, Sea Smoke Cellars winery attached RFID tags to wine barrels and then tracked the wine information to prevent channeling goods.
The RFID Research Center of the Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences has developed an RFID anti-counterfeiting system for alcohol. The system consists of specially designed caps and bottles, communication networks, RFID readers, and anti-counterfeiting database servers.
2.2 RFID technology is used for food tracking and tracing
The concept of traceability defined in the EU General Food Law is the ability to trace and track food, feed, food animals, or substances that are expected to be added to food or feed in all stages of production, processing, and marketing. The food safety traceability system is to use modern information labeling technology to effectively mark each node of the whole process of the food supply chain. The food chain, raw materials, processing, packaging, storage, transportation, sales, and other links in the supply chain carry out the whole process of quality control and Tracking and tracing, information flow and physical logistics are systematically combined. Once a health hazard is found, according to the information that must be recorded at all stages of the production and sales process, the flow direction is tracked, and food safety emergency response measures such as food recall or delisting are taken.
Food tracking and tracing is the main application of RFID technology in the food industry. The application of RFID systems can ensure high-quality data exchange in the food supply chain, thoroughly implement "source" food tracking solutions, and provide full transparency in the food supply chain. The RFID system can provide the connection between food and sources in the food chain to ensure the clarity of the food source to track specific animals or plants and farms, thereby achieving "from farmland to table" Quality monitoring and traceability.

The US government requires that food cattle must be accompanied by electronic tags. Using RFID technology to track livestock and poultry to obtain the connection between meat food and its animal source in the food supply chain, the source of meat food can be traced to achieve the purpose of providing people with assured food.
The Beijing Food Safety Supervision and Coordination Office proposed in 2006 to use ear tags and foot tags on animal products in key breeding bases, and to use RFID technology in slaughtering, production, and circulation to achieve livestock product breeding, acquisition, slaughtering, segmentation, and transportation 3. Sales information is recorded to form a trace file for easy tracking.
Shanghai has established a pork monitoring system based on RFID technology and put electronic radio frequency ear tags on pig ears to record pig feed, medical records, medicine feeding, group transfer, quarantine, and other information. Use RFID cards for "point-to-point" supervision before entering major city crossings and slaughterhouses to ensure that pigs enter the designated slaughterhouses. In the wholesale market, electronic tags are used to record the origin of pork traded, the transaction time, and the safety inspection results of edible agricultural products.
2.3 RFID technology is used for food quality monitoring
In the processing and storage of food, factors such as temperature, humidity, and time have a great influence on food quality. It is very important to record and analyze these factors. Combining RFID technology with sensor technology, it can sense the temperature, humidity, and light and other status information of surrounding items and the environment, and can use wireless communication technology to conveniently transmit this status information and its changes.
Fresh Alert has built-in temperature sensors and timers in RFID tags to signal when food is rotten and inedible.
SYSCO, the largest foodservice marketing and distribution organization in North America, has completed testing of radiofrequency and sensor systems for cryogenic storage and transportation systems, showing that RFID technology can monitor temperature and environmental conditions during food transportation.
Japan NTT Company experimented with using RFID technology to keep the wine quality fresh, by monitoring the temperature change during transportation to grasp the quality change of rice wine.
2.4 RFID technology is used for food logistics management
To ensure that food will not be sent or lost by mistake in transportation and circulation, or to reduce logistics costs and improve transportation efficiency, the entire logistics process needs to be monitored and managed. The application of RFID technology to the food logistics management system can give full play to its long-distance identification and multi-tag simultaneous processing features, greatly improving the food sorting ability, processing speed and accuracy, and reducing the risk of misdelivery or loss. Huge losses. When tracking important materials or dangerous goods, or searching for a certain item among many items, the application of RFID technology can also greatly improve work efficiency. Transport companies and sales companies can also grasp the latest position of goods through unlimited radio frequency identification technology, and can prevent problems such as theft and package adjustment.
Canadian Atlas Refrigerated Storage Group widely uses RFID systems in its food logistics cold chain in low-temperature environments, which not only reduces the labor intensity of workers, but also greatly improves efficiency, and promotes the integration of food cold storage and cold chain management.
Australia’s Moraitis has replaced the barcode with its RFID system to manage the transportation and sales of its hydroponic tomatoes. The system can provide the company with accurate data, including the packaging time, location, packaging date, and quality, category, and size.
In the past five years, Shanghai Wufeng listed companies have put into operation RFID slaughtering and implementation of the production monitoring and management system to mark and load related data to the pigs, and realize the data collection and information management of the whole process of slaughter and production, so that product managers can grasp and understand in time Product production and quality status.
2.5 Application of RFID technology in other aspects
Also, RFID technology can be used for the control of processing objects and processing stations to ensure the precise control of the product's precise formulation and improve product quality; RFID technology can also quickly identify the cause of product failure and improve product quality promptly; RFID technology can also be used In the feeding industry, it can be used to identify animals, record and control the plague, etc. Mainly include collar electronic tags, button-type electronic ear tags, ear injection electronic tags, and rumen electronic tags placed through the esophagus. information.
3 RFID technology prospect
RFID technology is developing rapidly at home and abroad. It can be applied to many links in the food field, which can ensure the safety of food, effectively control the outbreak of food-borne diseases, and exclude the restrictions of some laws and regulations on food import and export in China. The development of the product industry provides a technical guarantee. RFID is a booming technology with huge market potential. my country's radio frequency identification technology and application are still in the initial stage of development, but as technology improves, costs and prices fall, its development potential is huge, and the prospect is also very attractive.

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