Have you ever wondered if those coffee beans you just purchased are really "fair-trade, organic?"  How about if that bunch of asparagus was grown locally?  Well technology may be able to help us answer these questions.  Digital tracing tags may soon be added to foods to give consumers an insight into where the food came from.  If this technology catches on, it may be able hold supplier and distributors accountable for the food they sell.

Jan. 26, 2007 — Are you really sure that your specialty store wine comes from a small wine cooperative in Chile? Or that your Indonesian coffee beans weren’t illegally grown?

A new kind of digital tag could tell you yes or no, and even allow you to give some feedback about your satisfaction with the product.

The Fair Tracing project, led by Apurba Kundu of the University of Bradford, aims to narrow the gap between growers in underdeveloped countries and their consumers.

"As well as assuring ethical consumers that their product is not hiding dodgy or unfair practices, Fair Tracing would empower wine and coffee connoisseurs with additional information they already seek," said Kundu.

continue at Discovery News

Author Information -  During his spare time Eric writes for and maintains wannaveg.com. For his day job he works for an electronics company in San Diego, CA. Eric has been a vegetarian for about 10 years and believes that going 'green' and reducing meat consumption go hand-in-hand.

Tags: Food, Interesting, Organic, technology