RFID and WSNs for Traceability of Agricultural Goods from Farm to Fork: Electromagnetic and Deployment Aspects on Wine Test-Cases

The need of traceability systems adequate for food is a matter of fact: provenance, means of processing, time of the actions, temperature during transportation, are only a few of the possible data a consumer wants to know to buy with confidence. Among the others, the wine sector is especially susceptible of applying such a system: this sector produces highly added value products and the consumers are sensible to pay more money for a better (and also better traced) product. The RFID Farm to Fork project was born with the aim of testing the ability of RFID technology to implement a complete traceability system that covers the processes from the farm to the fork. In this work, based on the joint use of RFID technology and WSN, a system for the wine traceability from vineyard to the consumer glass is described along with related electromagnetic and deployment issues. Two different wineries, selected as pilot sites, are then presented and the current deployment status reported. © 2011 University of Split.