Food supply chain in the era of Industry 4.0: blockchain technology implementation opportunities and impediments from the perspective of people, process, performance, and technology

Abstract

The prevention of food loss throughout the supply chain, including manufacturers, has become a major challenge for a number of organisations. In addition, consumers are also increasingly interested in the authenticity of food and want to ensure that they receive the right quality of food. To address this issue, there is a need for reliable and robust tools to be available in the Industry 4.0 era that can trace the food throughout the supply chain from the farm through processing until it reaches the customer and, thus, ensure transparency. Using the people, process, and technology (PPT) model, this paper develops a blockchain-enabled food supply chain framework including the future opportunities and the present impediments based on the systematic literature review and semi-structured case interviews from the context of emerging economies. The study investigates the suitability of blockchain technology in resolving major challenges, such as traceability, trust, and accountability in the food industry. The study further paves the way for future researchers to address the technological and people-related challenges in the Industry 4.0 era to mitigate the emerging problems in the food sector. Interestingly, we did not find many issues in process- and performance-related aspects. The study offers empirical evidence of blockchain technology implementation in the Industry 4.0 era that opens up the discussion for future researchers and lists the potential threats.