Finnish researchers are testing a blockchain-supported app that displays information about food’s consequences

05 August 2022 — Researchers at Aalto University in Finland have developed and tested a pilot app to help consumers evaluate their shopping choices and offer new insights into the impact of certain foods.

“For example, many participants said the app was an eye-opener about the high emissions associated with cheese,” says Shreya Sood, who developed the index with Ruta Jumite.

She adds that the app helped people begin to question their assumptions about certain protein sources.

“Overall, users in the pilot project felt that it could help turn sustainability goals into actions. It motivated them to consistently make sustainable choices and created incentives to eat in a climate-friendly way, says Sood.

Blockchain for good
The study is part of the EU ATARCA project, which aims to create and promote “anti-rival tokens”, a blockchain-based technology that encourages the sharing of digital goods.

Food Wellbeing Index produced by Aalto’s Creative Sustainability Program (Credit: Aalto).Blockchain technologies can be used to reward individual choices, the researchers highlight. In the long run, they indicate that these tools can provide policy makers with a means to recognize individuals’ constructive sustainability impact.

In line with the study, the design researchers from Aalto’s Creative Sustainability Program developed a “Food Wellbeing Index” to capture the social, environmental, health and economic consequences of food choices.

The index integrates several variables to provide an overall overview that reflects the sustainability effect of dietary choices. In the long term, the integrity and transparency of this information can be supported through the use of blockchain throughout the supply chain, the researchers highlight.

Pilot the app in Helsinki restaurants
Building important food influence information into an app provides consumers with clear and easily accessible information, as was seen in a pilot study at the Unicafe restaurants at the University of Helsinki.

“For vegan-curious participants, the index influenced them to reconsider their meal choices after seeing the impact on various variables, which made them feel empowered to make a positive change,” comments Shood.

“Vegan participants, on the other hand, felt valued for their default choices.”

In addition to providing users with information to guide their individual decision, the app also uses anti-rival blockchain tokens and a distributed ledger to measure and aggregate choices, showing users how individual actions produce a collective effect.

Because the aggregated data from the app reflects the food choices and aspirations of the community, the researchers note that it can be used to identify gaps and shortcomings that need to be addressed in policy-making aimed at sustainability.

The research team Food Futures plans to run a second pilot experiment in the autumn.

Over the past year, consumer-facing platforms to increase the visibility of impact on food purchases have been brought to light.Crystallizes the effects of food
Although consumers are increasingly concerned about the environmental and health effects of their food choices, many people are unsure about what changes they should make, Aalto University researchers note.

“People often feel that they do not have enough information to guide their decisions, and it is also difficult to see the impact of individual consumption habits,” they emphasize.

Over the past year, consumer-facing platforms to increase impact visibility on food purchases – such as on-pack carbon labels – have emerged as consumers increasingly demand transparency.

Earlier this year, The Parmigiano Reggiano Consortium (Consorzio del Parmigiano Reggiano) teamed up with Dutch cheese brand designer Kaasmerk Matec and digital tracking developer p-Chip Corporation to embed traceable silicon microchips – the size of a grain of salt – directly into a food-safe Parmesan casein label placed on cheese wheel.

In other moves, PepsiCo is trialling technology from Security Matters – an invisible “marker” system that enables both physical and digital tracking to identify, track and sort packaging waste, which is logged onto a blockchain system. This is done to enable monitoring of closed-loop recycling, authentication of sustainability claims and improved waste sorting.

By Benjamin Ferrer

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