Harnessing Big Data in Food Safety

Big Data technologies have the potential to revolutionize the  agriculture sector, in particular food safety and quality practices.  This book is designed to provide a foundational understanding of various  applications of Big Data in Food Safety. Big Data requires the use of  sophisticated approaches for cleaning, processing and extracting useful  information to improve decision-making. The contributed volume reviews  some of these approaches and algorithms in the context of real-world  food safety  studies.  

Food safety and quality related data are  being generated in large volumes and from a variety of sources such as  farms, processors, retailers, government organizations, and other  industries. The editors have included examples of how big data can be  used in the fields of bacteriology, virology and mycology to improve  food safety.  Additional chapters detail how the big data sources are  aggregated and used in food safety and quality areas such as food  spoilage and quality deterioration along the supply chain, food supply  chain traceability, as well as policy and regulations. The volume also  contains solutions to address standardization, data interoperability,  and other data governance and data related technical challenges.  Furthermore, this volume discusses how the application of  machine-learning has successfully improved the speed and/or accuracy of  many processes in the food supply chain, and also discusses some of the  inherent challenges. Included in this volume as well is a practical  example of the digital transformation that happened in Dubai, with a  particular emphasis on how data is enabling better decision-making in  food safety. To complete this volume, researchers discuss how although  big data is and will continue to be a major disruptor in the area of  food safety, it also raises some important questions with regards to  issues such as security/privacy, data control and data governance, all  of which must be carefully considered by governments and law makers.