Pork is a big business in China, which produces more pigs than the next 43 pork producing countries combined. The country consumes about half the pork produced worldwide, with the average citizen eating about a half a hog each year. Pork is a major pillar of the economy in the Shandong Province, one of China’s most important agricultural regions. To limit the impact of porcine diseases and prevent tainted pork from being sold to consumers, Shandong Provincial Municipality asked Lushang Group, one of China’s top 10 retail companies, and its affiliate research body—the National Engineering Research Center for Agricultural Products Logistics—to devise a system that would improve accountability and safety in the region’s pork industry.
In 2010, Lushang Group began working with IBM to create the new system, which is being tested by six selected slaughter houses, six warehouses and about 100 Inzone hypermarkets and supermarkets across the Shandong province. When fully deployed in 2013, the system will allow Lushang Group to monitor and trace the movement of meat across all phases of the supply chain, including farms, processing plants, trucks and supermarkets.