Department of Information Systems

Faculty of Business & Informatics

Divine Word University

Project Report
Agri-Food Traceability and Transparency System for a
Smallholder Supply Chain

Abraham Mondo
Year 4 Student
Bachelor of Mathematics and Computing Science
2019

Supervisor(s):
Mr Elliot Pitalot
Dr Olivier Missa
Dr Nancy Irwin

Department of Information Systems

Department of Maths & Computing Science
Faculty of Business & Informatics
Divine Word University
Table of Contents
Bibliography .............................................................................................................................................. 1
Abstract ..................................................................................................................................................... 1
1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................................... 1
2. Project Context ..................................................................................................................................... 1
2.1 Background ..................................................................................................................................... 1
2.2 Current practice .............................................................................................................................. 2
2.3 Challenges ....................................................................................................................................... 2
2.4 Purpose and significance ................................................................................................................ 3
3. Literature Review .................................................................................................................................. 4
4. Proposed System................................................................................................................................... 5
4.1 Description ...................................................................................................................................... 5
4.2 Design.............................................................................................................................................. 5
4.3 Implementation .............................................................................................................................. 9
5. Methodology ......................................................................................................................................... 9
5.1 Framework, theories or models .......................................................................................................... 9
5.2 Technologies ....................................................................................................................................... 9
6. Issue Management.............................................................................................................................. 12
7. Future Development ........................................................................................................................... 13
8. Reflection ............................................................................................................................................ 13
9. Glossary ............................................................................................................................................... 14
10. References ........................................................................................................................................ 14
Acknowledgement .................................................................................................................................. 14
Bibliography

Abstract

This is report discusses the final year research project. The final year research project is Agri-Food
Traceability System for a smallholder supply chain. It outlines the process involved in developing the
proposed system which is Agri-Food Traceability System for a smallholder supply chain. The client of the
proposed project is Kamapim Limited. The project title serves as a basis of the problem exist in Kamapim
Limited in which recommended solution is derived from. The paper collectively outlines the process
undertaken to achieve the recommended solution of the company.

1. Introduction

In today’s world, technology is in the heart of every modern business organizations. Technology drives
business to proper greatly in profitability, oust manual labor and fast and efficient completion of process
in business organization. Therefore, this paper discusses the process involved in developing a proposed
system to solve a problem that exists within a company’s line of work.

This document provides a discussion of the context of the project including the background, problem
statement, and purpose and significance of the project. It also discusses the review of literature
pertaining to the project such as significant terms and concepts, high-level description and components
of the proposed solution or model. Further, it discusses the methodology that could be used to develop
the proposed solution including theories, models or processes and technologies. Finally, it discusses the
issues faced during the development of the project and its future development.

2. Project Context

2.1 Background

Kamapim Ltd is an agriculture company focused on developing high quality

sustainable agricultural crops with remote tribal landowners that protect
large tracks of primary rainforest and preserve traditional culture. The main
operation of the company is to provide a marketing platform for the remote
local famers to sell their sustainable agriculture crops on the world food
market. The main food that the company buys at the present is vanilla produced by local farmers.

Kamapim Ltd recently came into its operation in late 2018 and is situated in Jais Aben, 12.7km outside
Madang. Since Kamapim Ltd was established recently, it looks forward to expand its operations to serve
the small holder famers mainly in remote areas throughout Papua New Guinea. There are many areas
for expansion from staffs to facilities and ICT is one of those areas that Kamapim Ltd is focusing on to
provide and boost economy for the local farmers, the company and the country as a whole.

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The company has an ICT plan for agriculture delivery and is therefore currently developing technology
into its operations. The proposed system will mainly integrate the supply chain to link
producers/farmers and the client/consumers in terms of traceability and transparency. Certifications
such as Organic, Fairtrade, and Rainforest Alliance provide consumers with assurances that crop is
produced in places and under certain social and environmentally responsible conditions. However in
order to apply for such certifications for large scale small holder’s intensive data collection, and ICT
management, integration and visualization is required.

As a company, it focuses on linking the consumers/customers to the famers that grew the food and also
giving clients/customers access to information about the food they have purchased. Developing systems
and platforms for integration to multiple end users is therefore greatly needed by the company to
perform these tasks.

2.2 Current practice

The company buys vanilla from vendors who come directly to sell at a central location office. Farmers
claim they come from a location, but this is taken on trust, however, they could be coming from
somewhere else altogether, they could be middle buyers that have amalgamated crop from multiple
sources, so the traceability link is weak. The famers bring their vanilla beans to the central warehouse to
sell. At this house, the vanilla beans are digitally weighed in front of the farmer. The beans are also
checked for quality. Each package of beans then receives a label. No other information is attached on
that package. There is no system in place to render the specific information to the clients and consumers
for traceability and transparency.

Ultimately, Kamapim Ltd has made partnership with several rural remote communities that produce
vanilla mainly throughout Madang Province. The information for the each respective communities in
and around Madang is obtained by the company through partnership. Therefore, it would be clear that
vanilla was bought from that farmer not from anybody else and that farmer comes from that
community. As a result traceability is established. Each farmer from registered communities has been
identified individually and given a QR code, and identity card made. Each community, eventually garden,
and rainforest patch will be located via GPS mapping. It is therefore possible to collect data-rich
information about the individual farmer, community or region on production useful for forecasting, and
also provide valuable information for traceability and transparency; increasingly important in marketing
high value products.

The use of barcodes/QR codes enable full traceability to be established to the clients and consumers. A
system is therefore required to provide geo-referenced information on crop at different spatial scales to
different end users. For example it is envisaged that a code could be printed on product packaging that
enables end users (consumers) to see which rainforest they are helping to preserve by buying this
product.

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2.3 Challenges

The idea to propose the Agri-Food Traceability and Transparency System for a Small Holder is mainly to
provide traceability and transparency in the supply chain of the company in exporting vanilla beans to
clients and consumers for consumptions.
The two main problems that the company encounter at the present is that there is:
1. No Traceability
Consumers want to know:
 Who grew the vanilla
 Where the vanilla was grown
 How vanilla was produced
These information are very crucial in the western nations. It adds value to the product and also gain
consumer trust. By gaining consumers trust, the product or brand will be highly demanded on the
market which would eventually result in increased profitability.

2.4 Purpose and significance

The main purpose for the proposed system is to provide vital information of traceability and
transparency to the consumers and the certification clients. Traceability and Transparency is a means to
create confidence, trust and sustainability in trade relations for regulators, consumers, traders and
buyers in the supply chain. In order to earn this attributes mentioned above, the proposed system can
provide traceability and transparency information which include the following:

 Where the produce (vanilla) was grown

 Who grew the food (Vanilla)
 What type of land the food grows on
 What type of farming was used
 The size of the farm
 Maps: Using Global positioning system (GPS) to establish the ground position of gardens and
integrate these positions with satellite imagery - through this imagery, clients will able to look at
the farmers in its supply chain and evaluate tree cover loss or deforestation.

The proposed system will make all these information available on the company’s website and can be
accessed by scanning the QR code/ barcode on the product package using smart phones to learn
relevant information for the specific vanilla package on the market.

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3. Literature Review

The title of the project pose the vital concepts in which the proposed system is based on. These two
concepts are Traceability and Transparency. They are very big for need and it is very crucial in the world
food market in the western today.

According to (Opara, 2003), the concept of traceability refers to the collection, documentation,
maintenance, and application of information related to all processes in the supply chain in a manner
that provides guarantee to the consumer and other stakeholders on the origin, location and life history
of a product to ensure food safety and quality.

Traceability enables the consumer to know what type of land the food (vanilla) grow on, what source of
input materials applied as well as determining specific location and life history in the supply chains by
means of records (Onofrio, 2019).

(Opara, 2003) Also explains that Transparency is the concept of showing the quality of the product by
capturing quality data such as what type of agricultural practices and the data on how the food was
produce. This would enable for product certifications such as Organic, Fairtrade and Rain forest Alliance.
In the article (Keiner, 2019), more consumers are happy to pay more for food that is proven to be
sourced using product certifications which require the farmer to follow sustainable farming practices.

Making the traceability and transparency available to the consumers (end-users) is very crucial in the
world food market today. As more businesses digitalize, they can provide more information at a lower
cost to the end consumer through mobile apps and QR codes. This level of transparency helps protect
agribusiness and improves efficiency in farm operations (Keiner, 2019).

The (Annovazzi-Jakab & Nilses, 2019) have stated that the current traceability system in place only
enable the user to trace the origin and destination of products one step up and down the value chain.
(Annovazzi-Jakab & Nilses, 2019) Also outlined that there is room for producers, users or regulators to
determine the breadth, depth and extent of traceability and the related systems. This has led to a
multitude of different ways for how traceability is currently interpreted and implemented, and to a
variety of solutions ranging from specific labelling requirements to manual exchange of data and
dedicated (often-costly) software supported systems (Annovazzi-Jakab & Nilses, 2019).

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4. Proposed System

4.1 Description

In order to gain or earn consumer confidence and trust in delivering high quality vanilla, the company
has to make available the information on Traceability and Transparency to the consumers (end-users).
Thus, the system developed is mainly to perform these tasks.

The system has two main end-users namely Admin and Consumers.

1. The following functions can be performed by the admin of the Agri-Food Traceability System for a
Smallholder supply chain.

 The admin can log into the system with his/her username and password for security purposes.
 The admin can add or register farmers into the database by entering all the relevant information
regarding traceability as well as other information for the company.

Each farmer’s information is protected with their ID and password entered by the admin. This means
that on the consumer’s end, they will only see the information of the particular farmer that they
scanned. In developed nations, almost all individuals are IT literate which means they do all their
activities online such as purchasing items online. Therefore, they might temper with the URL of
traceability page to view the records of all the farmers so password and id number protects it.
If the consumer wants to change the id of the farmer to see the next farmer’s details, they cannot view
the information because it has be protected.

 The admin can view and search for registered farmers in the database. Admin can generate the
QR code for each registered farmer. Admin can also delete the records and edit/update the
records.
 The admin can also edit/update the details of the farmers

2. The consumer can perform the following activities to view the traceability information.

The overall process of the consumers is that they can access the information on Traceability and
Transparency via QR code which are embedded on the package. Upon scanning the QR code using a
smart phone, the result is then directed to the company’s website where all the relevant information
regarding that specific package can be learned.
The information displayed is vague because the company does not want to give out the sensitive
information to the potential buyers of vanilla who might interfere with the company’s market. However,
it gives enough general information to gain consumers trust.

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As stated above, the proposed system will be used by two end-users which are consumers/customers
and the admin.
The consumers will access general information regarding the product they purchased in terms of
traceability and transparency.
The admin will perform the CRUD functions with the farmer’s information regarding traceability.
The overall components of the proposed system comprise of:
1. Smart phone Device – This is basically to scan the QR code of the product to access the
information using any smartphone device.
2. QR code – This technology can have information embedded in where it can direct the user to
access the information.
3. Application server – This is where all the relevant information of traceability and transparency
can be displayed or rendered.
4. Database – This is where all the information regarding traceability and transparency is stored for
retrieval.

Figure 1. Component Diagram by Abraham Mondo

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 4.2 Design

Design phase is the process of software or system development where it translate the technical
concepts to a user requirements models so that it can satisfies a user need. It includes various models
that can encapsulates the aspect of user requirements. However, this project only render three models
that suffice the implementation of the proposed system. They are data flow diagram model, Entity
Relationship diagram and network diagram in which the system will be deployed upon.

1. Dataflow diagram Model

A data flow diagram (DFD) maps out the flow of information for any process or system. It uses defined
symbols like rectangles, circles and arrows, plus short text labels, to show data inputs, outputs, storage
points and the routes between each destination (Whata is Logical Network Diagram | Lucidchart, 2019).

Figure 2.Dataflow Diagram by Abraham Mondo

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 2. Entity Relationship Diagram

An Entity–relationship model (ER model) describes the structure of a database with the help of a
diagram, which is known as Entity Relationship Diagram. Depicted below is the ER model of the
proposed system. It has three tables which are login, villages and farmers. Villages and farmers table
are related by village ID.

Figure 3. Entity Relationship Diagram by Abraham Mondo

3. Network Diagram

A logical network diagram describes the way information flows through a network. Therefore, logical
network diagrams typically show subnets (including VLAN IDs, masks, and addresses), network devices
like routers and firewalls, and routing protocols. (Whata is Logical Network Diagram | Lucidchart, 2019)

Since it is a web-based application, it requires a network. It is proposed that the application will be host
on the Wix cloud server. The primary internet connection to interact with the system is Telikom PNG ISP
and the secondary link is Digicel ISP. Internet is accessed via wireless ADSL router to the end devices.

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Figure 4. Logical Network Diagram designed by Abraham Mondo

4.3 Implementation

This phase involves the actual coding takes place. All the models in the design phase is now translated
into working model.

The following figures shows the screenshot and the source code of the system.

 Login Page

5. Methodology

5.1 Framework, theories or models

Every project with respect to developing systems, there has to be a framework utilized to develop the
recommended solution. In this project, SDLC framework will be used to develop the proposed system.

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SDLC is a process in which software developers follow to develop a software product (SDLC Overview,
2019).

There are various SDLC models defined and designed which are followed during the software
development process. For this project, classical waterfall model of the SDLC will be employed which
include the following phases:
Phase 1: Requirements Analysis – This phase is where all the possible requirements of the system is
captured and documented.

Phase 2: System Design – The overall system architecture is designed based on the hardware and
system requirements extracted from phase 1.

Phase 3: Coding – This is where the coding of the system is implemented in small units.

Phase 4: Testing and Integration – In this phase, all the small units coded in phase 3 are tested for any
faults and failures and are integrated into a system.

Phase 5: Deployment of system – Once all the requirements and system is fully functional, the product
is released to the customer environment.

Phase 6: Maintenance – the final phase is to maintain the product software after it has been delivered
2or installed.

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 Requirement
Analysis
SDLC Waterfall Model

System Design

Coding

Testing and
Integration

Deployment of
System

Maintenance

SDLC Waterfall Model designed by Abraham Mondo

Since it is a waterfall model, all the phases outlined above will occur sequentially in a downward fashion.
The waterfall model was chosen because the targeted customers or end-users to use the system is
known (Leach, 2015).

Software Testing
Since the system did not have a predefined or set requirements to work towards, it used sandwich
testing to integrate all the different components of the system.

Sandwich Testing is the combination of bottom-up approach and top-down approach, so it uses the
advantage of both bottom up approach and top down approach. Initially it uses the stubs and drivers
where stubs simulate the behavior of missing component. It is also known as the Hybrid Integration
Testing (Sandwich Testing | Software Testing, 2019).

Figure 5. Sandwich Testing by Abraham Mondo

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5.2 Technologies

Technology have become an ever efficient tool used to carry out any forms of tasks in the world today.
There were several important technologies that were used as the tools to develop the proposed system.

 QR Code – Short for Quick Response code is a matrix of dots which contains information and is
usually attached on a product package to show its information. It can be scanned by
smartphone with in-built camera.
 GPS – Acronym for Global Positioning System which was used to locate the position of the farm
on the map.
 MySQL - MySQL is an open source relational database management system. It was used as the
system’s database.
 Sublime Text – is a sophisticated text editor that enables to write various codes such as PHP,
JavaScript, JQuery, CSS, HTML5, etc. It was used to mainly develop web-based application of the
system.
 Xampp - XAMPP is a free and open-source cross-platform web server solution stack package
developed by Apache Friends, consisting mainly of the Apache HTTP Server, MariaDB database,
and interpreters for scripts written in the PHP and Perl programming languages.
 Microsoft Visio – is a product of Microsoft office suite which was used to design various
diagrams for the system such as network diagram component diagram, dataflow diagram, etc.
 PHP QR Code - is an open source library available on Github. It was used to generate dynamic
QR code.
 JQuery Library – this is an open source library of the JavaScript. It was used to place the location
marker on the image map.

6. Issue Management

Every project during its life cycle encounters issues and constraints. These issues and constraints hinder
the progress of the project unless they are addressed or solved. In this project, there were several issues
encountered during the first four weeks of the project schedule.

Issues Strategies Addressed

Tasks done but not Since it’s the first time to embark on such project to follow the schedule, some
according to the of the tasks as outline in the scheduled were not followed accordingly.
schedule. However, the critical tasks were done during the four weeks so far.
Confusion in Had confusion about the attributes and entities for the database but managed
extracting to extract required information after thorough discussion with the company’s
information for the supervisor.
database
Difficulty in After going through third year’s unit for Relational Database, I had enough idea
forming Database to form entity relationships of the database.
Relationship

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Embedding Map One of the system’s requirement is to show location on the map. The google
into the webpage requires payment for using its google map API. Therefore, I need to improvise
to use other forms of maps to embed into the webpage.
QR code to store The main requirement of the system is to have QR code attached onto the
URL link to display vanilla package where it will store URL link. Upon user scan, it will bring up the
webpage upon webpage to show details about that vanilla. In order to achieve that in depth
scanning research will be carried out over the next remaining weeks.

7. Future Development

This system is a small component of a larger system. For future development, these there subsystems
are recommended to be integrated into the system. In the proposal outlined, there needs to be
transparency system for certifications purpose. The transparency component was not completed due to
time constraint. It will be integrated into the system later. This transparency system will include the
following:

I. Sustainable Agriculture information

II. GPS Satellite Imaging to show the rainforest
III. Certifications Attainments information

8. Reflection

Describe the lessons you have learned during the development of this project, and areas in which you
need to improve in the future.

There were two main lessons learnt during the development of this project.

1. Time management
Time management was the major setback that was encountered in the life cycle of the project.
There is a big need to manage time and allocate each tasks so that they are done within the
time frame.

2. Seek Experienced Technical Assistance

Seeking help from experienced technical people greatly help in this project.

The future improvement that needs to be stressed on is to explored and study the syntax of the
programming language that is suited for the right system.

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9. Glossary

Terms/Acronyms Definitions

QR Code Matrix dot image technology used to store certain information regarding a
product and can be retrieved via a smartphone with in-built camera.
SDLC System Development Life Cycle
Rainforest Alliance The Rainforest Alliance is an international non-profit organization working at the
intersection of business, agriculture, and forests to make responsible business the
new normal. We are an alliance of companies, farmers, foresters, communities,
and consumers committed to creating a world where people and nature thrive in
harmony (About Us | Rainforest Alliance, 2019).
Organic Organization that certifies agricultural food that were grown organically.
Fairtrade Fairtrade is about better prices, decent working conditions, local sustainability,
and fair terms of trade for farmers and workers in the developing world (What is
Fairtrade? | Fairtrade Foundation, 2019).
Small Holder A person who owns or manages an agricultural holding smaller than a farm
(Smallholder | Definition of Smallholder in English by Lexico Dictionaries, 2019).
Vanilla Vanilla is a type of orchid that is used to produce flavour.
GPS Global Positioning System
Supply Chain A supply chain is a network between a company and its suppliers to produce and
distribute a specific product to the final buyer.
Agri-Food Agri-Food is simply short for agricultural food which are produced agricultural
wise.
Traceability The process to track and source the food’s information.
Transparency The process to make available the quality information on the food.
Sustainable Simply refers to the environmental-friendly approach to do farming.
Consumer The person who buys the food for consumption.
Client The person who is targeted to used certain product or system.

10. References

Include references to sources. Use APA referencing style

Acknowledgement

I would like to greatly appreciate and thankful for the effort and guidelines given by my lecturer Mr.
Elliot Pitalot in this project to successful completion. I also would like to thank Dr. Olivier Missa and Dr.
Nancy Irwin to have given me this opportunity to work on this project.

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