An Information Management System Concept for Food Recycling

Transcription

1 An Information Concept for Food Recycling Rei Itsuki, Norihiko Kotani Department of Information Technology Faculty of Infrastructural Technologies Hiroshima International University 5-1-1, Hirokoshingai, Kure, Japan {r-itsuki, Abstract - An information management system concept with a web interface is proposed for integrating food recycling chain managements. The recycling problem is much discussed in various markets such as food, containers and packaging products, home appliances, construction materials, and automobiles. Although the word "recycling" is used over the different recycling field, the characteristic and the legislation of the recycling object are different in each field. It is necessary to understand the feature of requirements for information management systems to carry out an efficient, available recycling in each recycling field. In this paper, the requirements in the above recycling fields are compared and characteristic requirements especially for food recycling are extracted. And an information management system concept corresponding to these demands is proposed. This system has an integrative management interface which is designed to be opened to retail shops or recycling manufactures through a web interface. Recycling information is stored in a database of the system directly through the recycling works and is used to get control over daily works, quality management of recycled feed materials, or to make reports to corresponding recycling law. Thus efficient and inexpensive information management for the recycled items can be realized. Keywords: Supply chain management, information system, RF-ID tag, recycle chain management, traceability. I. Introduction In recent years, the market highly pays attention to the food recycling. Laws pertaining to the collection, reutilization, and disposal of various products, such as industrial machinery, semiconductor materials, plastic articles, have been revised and the management of such products has intensified. And it is intensifying for products such as food and livestock feed as well. For some time now, in order to improve production efficiency, further reduce inventories and production shipping costs, and maintain and improve customer satisfaction, particularly in the fields of production and distribution, information management has intensified in the supply chain (SC), the business process that covers products from production to sale. When supply chain management (SCM) [3][12] intensifies, production efficiency rises and large quantities of inexpensive products pour onto the market. On the other hand, once these products are used, how should they be collected, reutilized, and disposed of, and how should they be managed? This has become a major issue for the market and government. With conventional supply chain management, problems involving collection, reutilization, and disposal (hereinafter broadly referred to as "recycling") were often not included. In a broad sense, recycling is the latter half of supply chain management. The clear-cut management of the location of production, fertilizer and livestock feed being used, and distribution channel, in other words the improvement of traceability, is regarded as important [10]. Similarly, information management in the circulation process is severely asked for food and fodder [2]. According to the above market trend, there are various actions to try to construct the food traceability system using the radio frequency identification (RF-ID) tag. Especially, experimental proofs of systems that offers the consumer information on the production and the distributor of food, or constructions of the traceability system concerning the circulation of beef that originates in the BSE problem [13] are actively conducted. The cost reductions have been achieved by making RF-ID tags [7] smaller, and applications to a variety of fields are being examined [9]. With RF-ID tags, data in tags can be read and written without contact. In the sense that they transfer data, they can also be called data carriers. Although noncontact IC technology, such as that of RF-ID tags, is relatively more expensive than bar code technology, it has been used for cargo tracking control in the field of logistics [4], because data reading and writing are rarely affected by a dirty or damaged surface and alignment accuracy is not required. Taking information management technology that employs these RF-ID tags and introducing it into the field of supply chain management is expected not only to make production activities more efficient and labor-saving but to be a highly significant step toward achieving a recycling-oriented society. Recently, with the X/05/$ IEEE

2 aforementioned cost reductions, applications into a variety of fields in the general consumer market have been examined. The activity of Auto-ID Center that centered on M.I.T. (MIT) was succeeded to two groups. One is the EPC global [5] that promotes technical activities and the other is the Auto-ID Lab [1] that promotes the standardization activities. Especially, the latter tries the standardization of a series of activity of doing efficient SCM by appending the RF-ID tag to the article in SC, and managing information on the article collectively at some centralized control centers. In Japan the Ubiquitous ID Center is aiming to identify items by machine, using a Ubiquitous ID Chip (an RF-ID chip containing a microcomputer) that controls and makes determinations [11]. But most of these examinations are in the level of experimental proofs. Because they try to use even now expensive RF-ID tag compared with the bar code even if it tends to cheapness. Moreover, they try to examine a mechanism that information on the traceability is recorded in detail. There are few systems that examine disclosing necessary information from the viewpoint of the system cost reduction or the information disclosure to give safety to the civilian. This report discusses an information management system that is necessary to accurately recycle food, home appliances, and various other products efficiently, inexpensively, and legally. A design aimed at materializing such a system will also be created. In this context the series of operations that includes collection, separation, reprocessing, reshipment, and disposal will be referred to as recycling operations, and the management of these operations will be regarded as recycle chain management (). This report also describes the results of studying distribution/collection interfaces for information on recycling operations throughout the market, methods of integrating and managing collected information, and methods of disclosing information in accordance with the legal system, based on management information. Specifically, the report describes a local information input interface that uses a portable terminal and RF-ID tag, a synchronous collection/management method for information input via information and telecommunications networks, and a website-type interface for disclosing to recyclers the information they need to accommodate the legal system and for disclosing information to the administrative groups that execute the legal system. II. Tasks in execution In this chapter, characteristic of recycle business, problems in over various markets such as food, containers and packaging products, home appliances, construction materials, and automobiles. And characteristic requirements for the system in food recycling are described. 2.1 Problems in The first problem when thinking about the execution of is that information gathering bases distribute on a large scale and therefore an enough information gathering from each base and unitary management of collected information are difficult. Especially, a lot of food shops exist because it has stuck to people's lives. The part of products is collected by the collection though the most part sold in the shop circulates to the general consumer home. It is difficult to manage both information from production to sales and information since it sells at the same level. The second problem is to take time from the collection of the collection thing to the total of the collection data. Moreover, it is necessary to fill in the collection data as many as two times. The collection goes round a lot of bases by the pickup truck for the collection and recycling (the re-processing) food and it collects it. The form that showed the list at the round destination is carried, and the collection data of each base is filled in on the form while going it. The collection materials is carried to the middle base after it goes it when they are consolidated in the middle base once, and the forms that fills in the collection data are handed over to the heavy-duty truck of the arrangement, as in Figure 1. It will take time until the collection data finally delivery to the office which the data is managed, and the collection data is input to the computer to being managed on the computer. : s : Routes : Factory : Data Figure 1. Outline of material collection business. In the third problem, it is a difficult point that the collection data succeeds the former management data. When the management object is food, it is difficult to give administrative information to an individual article. For instance, local information management before and behind information management for the lot unit and a specific manager is often done like the management number of the individual the date and before it dismantles it of the harvest. Therefore, local information management by a lot unit or a before and behind a

3 specific manager is often done. An individual in the marketing channel cannot help managing the traceability, and management that exceeds it is difficult. Popular consideration to recycling improves in recent years and the thing like a food tray for instance has been collected but, however, the management of the information level is not enough to report on the collection amount according to the legislation. The fourth problem is that the load for each 's information management system construction in the marketing channel is large when seeing from the side because the data management for is for an individual task and they cannot help automatically doing system construction. Moreover, united information management is not executed easily when seeing from an administrative side that is the management subject because information exists dispersedly to an individual in the marketing channel. The fifth problem is a point that the price of the RF- ID tag is still more expensive than that of the bar code in case that the RF-ID tag is located as a tool only to assign a number to the recycling objects or to relate traceability information that centers on circulation information to the number. Although how use the RF-ID tag is examined through various experimental proofs now, the price of the RF-ID tag is often considered as a bottle neck of system construction at the stage where the materialization of the system is examined after the experimental proof. The sixth problem is that a physical specification of the RF-ID tag is different in each vender and that the data format to be a key to article information managed by is still different in each vender or each standardization promotion group although it has been expected as a new technology for the product information management. The application of the RF-ID tag has been remarkable from the production site as a medium to manage information on the product so far. A technical improvement and a further miniaturization concerning the RF-ID tag advance after the latter half of 1990's, and, consequently, it tends to the price cutting. The problem in application on the size and the cost side is being canceled and application to the management object of, for instance, a large amount of consumer goods management etc. from which application has been put off up to now is reexamined. In addition, as the range of the application examination spreads, comparatively cheap RF-ID tag has come to be equipped with the readout function or the rewriting function which is equipped with only expensive RF-ID tag up to now. Application of the RF-ID tag to the production site is paid attention as a medium to manage information of the product. However, there are some problems that united management cannot be done even if it is the same kind of product if same kind of RF-ID tag is not used because the specification is different under the present situation depending on the vender for the RF-ID tag, for instance, used frequency, built-in data, it s format, and addition functions like rewriting or multi readouts at same time, etc. 2.2 Tasks in support system development In this paper, it thinks about the construction of the support system which has a advantage in terms of the traceability and the maintenance fee by especially taking up concerning recycling food. Here, five problems on the support system construction are described based on the above-mentioned background. The first task is to establish the system that updraw the collection data from the market of the material certainly and efficiently. This deals with the first and second problem above-mentioned. In many cases, collection s use the transportation means such as pickup trucks, go round many retails in a day. The most worrying point in the collection is that the collection cost is high because a small amount of collection demand is generated irregularly in the distributed region and it cannot help becoming human-wave tactics. The collection data is often filled to a paper list at collection retails without carrying about the computer machine so as not to become the load of the collection work. However, it is the most important problem as entrance of the support system to updraw the collection data efficiently as timely as possible as shown in the point of sales system in recent years. The second task is to give administrative information to a collected material to manage it when it is collected and in addition the information given first is succeeded to when the collection thing arranges in the process of the collection. This deals with the third problem. The collected material is carried between two or more s while it is collected and is re-processed, and is soled in the collection route. It is indispensable to manage data unitedly by relating individual collection information in the recycling chain for the relevant information to be managed through a series of recycling business. The third task is to construct the support system while adjusting participation person's interests in the recycling chain [6]. This deals with the fourth problem. Originally, the retail shop should be correspondent to an administrative measure. However, it takes much time and cost when an individual shop's having individually responded. At the same time, it takes much time to consolidating these recycling data. On the other hand, when seeing from collection 's side, they try to acquire a lot of shops even a little because doing a lot of collections leads to their profit improvement. It is easy to advance the shop acquisition if the collection enters with a certain incentives for the shop. Some collection s are reporting on the collection amount data that the

4 shop is originally sure to be managing. It takes much time and load for the collection to correspond to many shops. It is important to reduce the overall cost for by facilitating correspondence to the legal system. In the independent construction of each recycling of the support system, it costs an after all similar as for any a system construction cost and the load doesn't decrease. Moreover, it doesn't lead to the reduction of the load in individually corresponding for the legal system. The mechanisms which extracts necessary data for the legal system from the managed collection data and which is able to refer necessary data in a view point of the administrative side are needed. The fourth task is a managing and activating method of the updraw data. This deals with the third problem, but it mainly deals with the purpose of itself. The purpose of here is to manage accurate collection data, and to use it to expand the business scale by the efficiency improvement of the recycling business. It is necessary to maintain the freshness of the collection material especially for food, to raise the commercial value of the recycling thing, and to give the consumer the sense of security on the other hand according to the accuracy of the. The additional feature is necessary that not only maintains the collection data by the support system but also totals the variable situation of freshness and the amount of the collection material from the collection data and presents. The fifth task is to give additional values to the RF- ID tag use that are the technology paid attention to in a current market. This deals with the fifth above-mentioned problem. It is necessary to give the additional values to the RF-ID tags only to think that it is appropriate to use them with a current price The sixth task is a better use of the RF-ID tag that is the technology paid attention to in a current market. This deals with the sixth above-mentioned problem. It is examined that RF-ID tag is attached to parts in the production process for the efficiency improvement of SCM, and is used to manage production information [9]. When the application of the RF-ID tag to SCM would advance in the future, various RF-ID tags with different specification will be used in the market. However, when seeing from user's side, it is important for the user to identify an individual solid for management, and it is not important to worry about the difference in the specification of tags. It is necessary to take some devise in the system not to leave their business untouched although what kind of RF-ID tag is used in the recycling chain. III. Feature of support system In this chapter, an outline of support system to achieve the problems described in paragraph 2.2 and five features of this system is shown according to Figure 2. Processing Processing Processing Factory Factory Factory RF-ID tag IDs, Recycle Data, Products Data Information Center Product Product Data Product Data Data Recycle Data system Web site (ASP) Database Database Database RF-ID tag IDs, Recycle Data, Quality Data Database Web site Coordination system Home Page Access (Free access) Consult/Report (ID/Password) Consult/Report (ID/Password) Recycle Figure 2. An outline of support system Data Handling Populace Breeding Administrative Administrative office Office A. Local type data input system using RF-ID tag and personal digital assistant This system has collection bases which have an individual identification serial number, and sends the form that printed the collection base and the collection route from Office on the collection beforehand to deal with the first problem described in the section II. The ID number for the collection base that became this key put up the RF-ID tag to the collection container, and when collecting it, read the number of the RF-ID tag by using the personal digital assistant with the reader function. It is needed for the collection system to collect material data efficiently from the collection base like distributed retails and the mechanism that the collection data can be updrawn at collecting point. The personal digital assistant retrieves present collection base data of built-in data, displays in the display device, and presses the input of the amount of the collection and the qualitative level to those who collect it. Because the collection data is input after the identification number of the base is read in the base, it is thought that the input mistake is not generated easily. An alternative method of using not the RF-ID tag but the bar code system is also available. In this case, there is a cost advantage. However, the bar code easily cannot be endured against an exposure to water and dirt on the site and it may be needed for s to try to put a new bar code. Moreover, it is thought that the worker refuses the input of the collection data by the personal

5 digital assistant in this case because of cumbersome feeling. B. Data relation management with RF-ID tag To deal with the second problem, this system consolidates various data generated on the recycling chain in shape to relate the collection data and the quality data to ID information on the RF-ID tag. The collection data is generated by manual input or automatic input by using a handy terminal. The quality data is generated by using the RF-ID tag with a sensor function concerning temperature, ph, or humidity, as in Figure 3. Recycle material data at retails ID Date Time personnel Amount... Temperature PH Memo ID Date Time personnel Amount... Temperature PH Memo ID Date Time personnel Amount... Temperature PH Memo... Recycle material data at bases ID Date Time Base personnel Amount... Temperature PH Memo ID Date Time Base personnel Amount... Temperature PH Memo ID Date Time Base personnel Amount... Temperature PH Memo ::: Recycle material data at factory ID Date Time Factory lot # Amount... Temperature PH Memo ID Date Time Factory lot # Amount... Temperature PH Memo ID Date Time Factory lot # Amount... Temperature PH Memo Recycled Product data at factory ID Date Time Factory Product Amount Customer... Temperature Memo ID Date Time Factory Product Amount Customer... Temperature Memo ID Date Time Factory Product Amount Customer... Temperature Memo Figure 4. Data management by using RF-ID tags C. Construction of common information management center Figure 3. Utilization of RF-ID tag with sensor First of all, information that becomes a key is an identification number of each collection base. This is realized by fixing the RF-ID tag to the collection container in the collection base. This identification number is used to identify the collection base. It is possible to preserve information of the date of collection, a name of worker or quality of collected materials by relating to this collection base number when collecting it at the same time. In addition, the quality information on the collection material such as temperature, humidity, and ph can be preserved with collection information by using the sensor function. Next, the RF-ID tag is put up to the container on the side where the collection business is done. As a result, even when the collection material of two or more collection bases enters in one container, it comes to be able to manage the relation, as in Figure 4. In addition, information management becomes possible by similarly using the RF-ID tag when the collection material was consolidated in the middle base and when the collection material is finally collected at the recycling factory. The relation management between the collection material and the recycling commodity also becomes possible in the stage of recycling process or the recycling product management. In order to deal with the third problem, the information management center that can be shared among several users is constructed, and the system that supports each 's is constructed in the center, as in Figure 2. When each tries to construct his information management system for, all of them will have to bear all of system construction cost. The load of this is very large for a who has done the business with the paper base for instance up to now. The each 's cost load can be decreased by setting up the information center that can be shared, and offering the model concerning the collection of data, accumulation, and the retrieval, etc. in that. In addition, because this 's information will be unitary managed in this information management center, it becomes easy to consolidate information on the same field. It comes to be able to foresee the recycling situation of the field widely in a short time. And it becomes easy to obtain target information on the recycling field if it sees from an administrative side that is the sponsoring origin of the legislation. It becomes to offer various services such as making a necessary annual report and notifying automatically, or extracting necessary data for the document to be submitted from each to an administrative side at the information management center. D. information transfer system using a public Web site

6 In order to deal with the fourth problem, this system accompanies the information management center described in paragraph A and moreover, the system automatically discloses the administrative information that should be disclosed according to the legislation degree to the Web site. As a result, the system can be easily achieved a system which the industrial-government complex manages in union. A general consumer can understand the situation of in the object field if necessary by disclosing information to a general consumer at the same time. Because a general consumer can see an administrative measure appropriately held in the form of data, a bigger sense of security can be obtained. E. RF-ID tag interface with attribute query function Moreover, in order to deal with the fifth problem, the personal digital assistant has an interface which inquires a related attribute from the read identification number. It is assumed that two or more kind of RF-ID tag comes to be used when the RF-ID tag comes to be used widely. In that case, it is possible to show that it is just like using the same kind of tag by seeing from the end user by registering and maintaining correspond information to the information management center without compelling a specific RF-ID tag to the collection base and the collection who becomes an end user. However, when it comes to use two or more kind of RF-ID tag, it is thought according to circumstances that the cost of the reader rises. It is because the function to achieve two or more kind of data reading/writing is needed on the reader side at the level of physical processing. In that case, it is necessary to use the standardized RF-ID tag as much as possible and the ingenuity that reduces the development cost. IV. Conclusions In this paper, some action tasks to deal with the problem concerning the recycling business in the food field and those problems especially were described. Next, it explained a necessary function for the support system to materialize and the whole image. The support system contains the local type information gathering system that used the RF-ID tag with the sensor function, the unitary management method of recycle business information, the unitary information management method by the information management center, and the method of indicating situation by using a public Web site. This system keeps combining of retails, collection s, and administrative group achievement of in their pertinent field in mind. Though the lowering the cost of the RF-ID tag has not been necessarily achieved still under the present situation, the prospect that the cheap, efficient RF-ID tag that can be widely used for practical use in the market until fiscal year 2007 is obtained from manufacturers' sides. It is thought that cheaper, more certain can be achieved by using the RF-ID tag as an information management means, and aiming at the materialization of that the industrial-government complex combines. References [1] Auto-ID Lab, URL: Jun 11, [2] D. Cyranoski: Japan s first BSE case fuels fears elsewhere, Nature, Vol. 413, p.337, Sep [3] D. Simchi-Levi, P. Kaminsky, E. Simchi-Levi: Designing and Managing the Supply Chain Concepts, Strategies, and Case Studies, McGraw Hill [4] E. Franzelle: Supply Chain Strategy, p.213, MacGraw-Hill [5] EPC global, URL : June 11, [6] H. L. Lee and C. Billington: Managing Supply Chain Inventory: Pitfalls and Opportunities, Sloan Review, Vol.33, pp65-73, Spring [7] K. Finkenzeller: RFID Handbook: Radio-Frequency Identification Fundamentals and Applications, John Wiley & Sons [8] K. Takaragi, M. Usami, R. Imura, R. Itsuki and T. Satoh: An ultra small individual recognition security chip, IEEE MICRO, pp Nov.-Dec [9] R. Itsuki, H. Shibata, Y. Ikkai and N. Komoda: The Autonomous Information Design for Item using Rewritable RF-ID tags in Supply Chain, in Proc. of 2003 IEEE Int. Conf. on Emerging Technologies and Factory Automation(ETFA 2003), pp Sep [10] S. Soga, Y. Hiroshige, A. Dobashi, M. Okumura and T. Kusuzaki: Products Lifecycle Using Radio Frequency Identification Technology in Proc. of 1999 IEEE Int. Conf. on Emerging Technologies and Factory Automation(ETFA'99), pp Oct [11] Ubiquitous ID Center, URL: June 11, [12] V. H. Pooler, D. J. Pooler: Purchasing and Supply creating the vision, Chapman & Hall [13] EAN, International & European Meat Expert Group: Traceability of Beef, EAN International 2000.