Wasp Barcode Technologies: The Barcode Solution People

Produce Traceability Initiative (PTI)


The Tomato Scare of 2008. 380 Million Eggs Recalled in August 2010. October 2009 Peanut Butter and Other Peanut Containing products recall. Every year, every month, every day it seems that we hear that some food product is recalled. In order to address this issue, an organization has been created called the “Produce Traceability Initiative.” This organization’s vision is: Supply a chain-wide adoption of electronic traceability for every case of produce by the year 2012. By having produce be traceable it means that when there is a problem with the produce that a quick and controlled recall can be put into place. Meaning that instead of no one wanting to eat tomatoes (see 2008) and restaurants not putting tomatoes in their food, the tomatoes that were bad would have been recalled and the rest of the tomatoes would continue to be able to be sold and eaten. 
The Produce Traceability Initiative was created to make food recalls faster, more controlled, and focused only on the bad items. System ID and ToolWorx PTI solution allows companies to be PTI compliant while keeping hardware costs at a minimum.
There is a 7 step process in order to become PTI compliant.
  1. Obtain Company Prefix
  2. Assign GTIN numbers
  3. Provide GTIN Information to Buyers
  4. Show Human-Readable Information on Cases
  5. Encode Information in a Barcode
  6. Read and Store Information on Inbound Cases
  7. Read and Store Information on Outbound Cases
Steps 1, 2, and 3 should have already been completed. We are now in stage 4, 5, and 6. These 3 stages are to be completed by the end of the year. There are several providers with solutions that allow you to become PTI compliant. Each has their own unique solution; below are just a few of the providers. System ID has partnered up with ToolWorx because of their unique solution that allows hardware cost to be kept at a minimum and allows companies to be PTI compliant. This solution is simple, affordable and relatively painless. Why wait for this initiative to become a government requirement? Get in early and be one step ahead of the competition.