The AGRO Programme
The main objective of GS1 Romania AGRO Programme is to promote, at national level, GS1 standards for food products traceability by developing solutions adapted to the Romanian businesses needs and according to the National Sanitary Veterinary Agency politics and objectives and European Union Regulations. For 2007, GS1 Romania AGRO programme is oriented on two sectors: wines traceability and meat traceability.I. Wines Traceability
The project started in 2006, on ICDVV Valea Calugareasca request, with the development of a software solution and a client work station for performing wines traceability and continues in 2007 with two objectives: Implementation of the IT client solution at wines producing GS1 Romania member companies, organised in a working group; Developing the connection between the traceability web site and the client data bases in order to satisfy the external requirements for verifying wines. The client application, SABASYUS, is configurable according to the implementing company type, from grape producers to wines bottlers. Each user company can keep registrations of specific processing done to the product, so that the complete tracing information results by answers concatenation. The information is loaded according to some predefinite models, specific to each actor. The information concatenation is realised through an electronic environment created around a router software platform that interconnect client applications on the value chain. SABASYUS work station is already implemented at two wines producing companies (ICDVV Valea Calugareasca and SC VINIA SA Iasi) and is available to all GS1 Romania member companies. Also, an implementation guide comprising case studies of wines value chain re-enactment was realised as a result of the tests and observations received following the implementation. In January was constituted an ECR Romania working group for traceability with the objective to establish and measure the key indicators in order to demonstrate the efficiency of this traceability solution.
II. Meat traceability
a) Red meat traceability (beef and pork)
Meat traceability processes are based on product identification in each producing, processing and distribution stage: slaughtering house, cutting plant, retail point of sale. In 2004, GS1 Romania planed, in the framework of the AGRO programme, based on the professional standards SP EAN -10, and according to EC Regulation 1760/2000 and MAAP Law No. 345/2002, to realise a traceability data base for beef products. Consequently, a traceability portal named „Tracking and tracing site for beef processing”. The application function as following: each beef producing/processing company inputs in the data base, online, information concerning meat origin and the transformation suffered at his facilities; the traceability data base is connected to the national data base for animals’ health administrated by ANSVSA, which allows the slaughter house to know the data about the slaughtered animal. Control institutions and consumers can consult the data base for security and traceability information on products, using product GTIN and lot number as access keys. Starting from this result, the AGRO programme has new objectives for 2007. A working group was established (in the frame of ECR Romania initiative) by GS1 Romania member companies in the field of meat production, processing and distribution. Following the consultations with ANSVSA, we have decided that this year, beef traceability data base to be extended to pork meat. The project allow for the connection with ANSVSA data base, objective uncompleted in 2004. For the moment, each actor will introduce animal identification data manually, starting from the animal’s ear tag.
b). Fowl traceability
Since in the working group, the poultry companies are in majority, GS1 Romania has decided to prioritize the project for fowl traceability. Thus, the client work stations for fowl traceability will allow every company in the field to register and keep information locally according to the legal requirements for food security, and to transmit them electronically, on the investigator’s request, using a router that interconnect local data bases. Tests will be performed at SC Agricola Internaţional Bacau. Based on the results and observations received, the client work station will bi finalised and made available for all interested GS1 Romania member companies. The AGRO Programme will finalize with an implementation guide that will be distributed to meat processors wanting to implement a tracking and control system based on GS1 standards. The solution will be presented in a wider frame in a communications session that is programmed to take place on June 21st 2007.