The company Envisible is using a combination of technologies to make supply chains more transparent. The company traces its products by collecting and verifying data at each step, from the first mile to the grocery store.

Co-founders Mark Kaplan and Jayson Berryhill created the food supply company as a response to the fraud and human rights abuses that plague opaque supply chains.

The seafood industry in particular is rife with unethical practices. Kaplan points to canned tuna price fixing and slavery at sea as just a few examples of the “appalling” conduct of the industry.

“Integrity and supply chain stakeholders are not synonymous,” Kaplan tells Food Tank. “That’s why traceability is so necessary.”

Kaplan and Berryhill previously worked with small-scale fishers in a partnership with the U.S. Department of State, though the project didn’t take the seafood product all the way to market. But to ensure full food system visibility from ocean to store, the pair realized they would have to create a company that encompasses each step of the supply chain.

The pair’s solution was Envisible, a company that supplies sustainable, traceable seafood to Topco Associates. The grocery cooperative then sells the products under its Full Circle Market brand.

The company currently sources its seafood from six fisheries that are known for their work in sustainability.

But it’s one thing to claim transparency and sustainability, Kaplan says, and another to prove it. For example, he points to Cargill and Nestlé, who espouse the value of supply chain traceability on their websites. But they were sued by Côte d’Ivoire farmers who claimed the cocoa companies use forced and child labor in their supply chains.

That’s why Kaplan sought to build technology into the bones of Envisible.

Read the full article about food supply chain transparency by Elizabeth S. Eaton at Food Tank.