This blockchain system tracks ingredients from farm to table

Industries outside the tech world are using data and technology more and more these days to improve efficiency, find solutions to problems and create new opportunities for greater openness and innovation. The agriculture and food sectors are using data and digitization as a means of improvement, but few have used blockchain, the digital ledger technology that allows cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin to move from hand to hand.

Enter Merge Impact, which bills itself as the first and only blockchain-powered agricultural measurement and data solution to help farmers, food producers and brands better understand the impact of their practices and purchases down to the field level.

From the ground up

Merge Impact co-founders Ben Adolph and Beth Robertson-Martin both come from agricultural backgrounds. But they have professional perspectives from different sides of the industry – Adolph in soil health and fertilizer sales and Robertson-Martin in raw material procurement, most recently for General Mills.

Each realized the limitations of their respective fields and set out to solve them with their new agri-tech company powered by blockchain. “I had a thesis that there are a lot of food companies that actually need to solve regenerative supply chain problems,” Robertson-Martin explained.

“We saw an opportunity to connect climate impacts at the farm level and bring value to food businesses,” Adolph added. “She has the solutions from the brand side. I have them from the farm side.”

Blockchain for transparency

Using data as a means to analyze and improve systems is common in the modern digital age, but blockchain takes these processes one step further. “I think of blockchain as a tool in the toolbox, but it’s one that makes things faster and easier for us. Blockchain really helps prevent data corruption and data loss,” Robertston-Martin said.

Merge Impact’s use of blockchain allows it to function as a software solution for transparent supply chains, as raw materials are digitally logged from field to customer and everywhere in between. This type of information is becoming increasingly crucial as companies aim to provide their customers with transparent, accurate and easily accessible data.

Transparency for brands, consumers and farmers

Major food manufacturing companies have made public commitments to regenerative sourcing worth trillions of dollars. But many of these commitments have been based on dubious data, resulting in shaky and unfounded sustainability action plans.

As a company that operates on the integrity and security of data, Merge Impact remains a neutral party in the collection of information on its platform. Third-party partners like EarthOptics — which specializes in measuring soil data, including how much carbon is stored in the soil — allow the company to provide more detailed information to customers while remaining unbiased.

Merge Impact’s use of third-party data collection and blockchain technology allows food companies to understand the impact of their supply chains and make reliable claims about their products. In turn, customers can rely on these claims to make better choices about the products they endorse.

From the farmer’s perspective, data platforms like Merge Impacts make it easier for brands to find and connect with organic and regenerative farmers. It also helps farmers champion their services as a premium, as brands see how sustainable practices translate into improved soil health values ​​such as carbon storage and water retention.

Merge Impact also ensures that farmers can retain ownership of their data, which can be shared, transferred or monetized at their discretion.

“What blockchain allows us to do at the farm level is monetize data for farmers,” Adolph said. “We never claim ownership of data. If you go into another ag-tech platform, when data comes into that platform, it’s the platform’s data. But in our case, the producer creates the data, and that producer ultimately owns all the data . It’s really the only system where the manufacturer has an account in the product.”

Merge Impact simply serves to facilitate the movement of data, while giving manufacturers and brands total ownership of the data that the company and its partners help collect and store.

“If it can be measured, we can measure it.”

Merge Impact data has proven to be effective in helping companies measure and manage their greenhouse gas emissions. It also serves to inform other key indicators for mission-based food systems, such as biodiversity and water use.

“If it can be measured, we can measure it and we can track it,” Robertson-Martin said. “Not only do you want to know where the oats came from, you want to know where your carbon, your biodiversity, your pollinator habitat metrics came from down to the field level, down to the subfield level. We make it very easy to get to that level of granularity.”

With producer and brand ownership of proprietary data, combined with the security and integrity of blockchain technology, Merge Impact’s platform serves as an end-to-end solution for traceable supply chains for regenerative, organic and any other type of mission-based food systems.

“Ultimately, Merge Impact uses blockchain to make ag-tech one solution for the industry and not just one product for the industry,” Adolph said.

Image credit: PHÚC LONG and Marc Kleen via Unsplash