News roundup: Food safety, the eclipse & Netflix, government’s data problem
IBM’s take on this week in news
This week in brief
- Retailers unite to make food safer
- The eclipse eclipses Netflix
- Governments are buried in data
- Redesigning cities — for mental health
Numbers of the week
Retailers unite to make food safer
It can take weeks to identify and pinpoint where precisely a food contamination originated, causing increased illness, lost revenue, wasted product, and a tarnished reputation. In a recent incident, it took two months to identify the farm source of papayas contaminated with salmonella.[1] The outbreak, ultimately traced to a farm in Mexico, made 173 people across 21 U.S. states sick, and tragically led to one death.
That’s just one example of a complex global food ecosystem where a dearth of information and inability to rapidly trace the source of food safety issues stymies quick and decisive responses. According to the World Health Organization, one in ten people fall ill, and 400,000 die every year from foodborne diseases — with children under five accounting for almost a third of those deaths.[2]
Walmart, Unilever, Tyson foods, Nestle, Kroger, Dole and other food giants are partnering to improve food safety by adding visibility to the food supply chain. This unique coalition of competitors will use blockchain to maintain secure digital records and ensure their food is more traceable.
“The food system can collaborate in sharing data. Everybody’s putting their data in the blockchain, but we’re doing it for the common good… This concept of a digital and transparent food system creates shared value.”
— Frank Yiannas, Vice President of Food Safety at Walmart
Blockchain helps address food safety challenges by establishing a trusted environment for all transactions. All participants of the global supply chain — growers, suppliers, processors, distributors, retailers, regulators and consumers — can use a blockchain network to trace contaminated product to its source in seconds to ensure it is safely removed from store shelves and to stem the spread of illnesses.
“It’s not only about doing business but also about solving an issue for the world… There is no competition here… It is like security. Everybody wants to participate for the good of the population.”
— Laurence Haziot, Global Managing Director and General Manager for IBM Consumer Industries
THE ANGLE
- A new consortium of food giants will work with IBM to identify new areas where the global supply chain will benefit from blockchain.
- “In food outbreaks, you’re guilty until proven innocent. You can clear your good name really quickly [with Blockchain],” Walmart’s Frank Yiannas said.
- Businesses are already putting blockchains to the test in a variety of industries, including cargo shipping, poultry and diamonds.
- We have identified more than 250 different foodborne diseases. Most are infections, caused by a variety of bacteria, viruses and parasites that can be foodborne.[3]
The eclipse eclipses Netflix
The North American solar eclipse this week impacted California’s solar power, cost the US economy nearly $700 million in reduced productivity, and inspired 66 million people worldwide to create 240 million interactions on Facebook.[4] The rare cosmic event even managed to lower Netflix’s viewership 10%.
Instead of fighting the crowds to see the eclipse in the “path of totality,” 3.2 million viewers opted to visit a NASA live stream on Facebook.[5] Internet and telecommunications companies had prepared for the crush of data, boosting network capacity by 300% to handle millions of people sharing video and photos nearly all at once.[6]
Governments have more data than they can handle
Governments everywhere collect vast amounts of data but struggle to analyze and manage it all. A recent Governing.com article notes that government workers spend ~80% of their time trying to find data and only ~20% of their time analyzing it.[7] In one example, caseworkers spend as little as 20% of their day on human interaction. Paperwork and other non-interactive tasks consume up to 50% of caseworkers’ time.
A treasure trove of insights within this data could help government organizations reduce crime, provide personalized, customer-centric services to struggling citizens, mitigate tax fraud, or improve traffic flows. And the amount of data will only skyrocket as cities embed IoT technology into their infrastructure and new sources and types of data emerge.
But is government technology ready? The White House Office Of American Innovation, citing the 2016 U.S. Government Accountability Office report, recently revealed that the Department of Defense still uses 8-inch floppy disks, a technology laughably out of date even in the seminal 1983 movie WarGames. They discovered some other surprising facts, such as 90% of healthcare forms are paper and the Department of Veterans Affairs spent 75% of its tech budget maintaining outdated legacy software systems.
Before even discussing the legacy tech, the government should know their customer — the engaged citizen with high expectations for services.
Designing mega cities for mental health
With 2/3 of the world’s population expected to live in cities by 2050 and some urban areas experiencing staggering growth (the population of Shenzhen, China grew 6,040% from 1985–2015), the way urban environments impact mental health is becoming a bigger issue.[8] A new report, addressed in a Citylab article, assesses how “Tokyo’s infrastructure affects residents’ emotional well-being, offering lessons for other cities.”[9]
The center for Urban Design and Mental health recommends four themes that cities should weave into their design: green spaces, active spaces, social spaces and safe spaces. In Japan, government officials had primarily emphasized physical health in their urban design, but are now creating public spaces that also include more “greenery, walkability, and beauty.” One project empowers citizens to create small green spaces all over the city, such as on rooftops, parking lots, and even railroads — offering tax incentives to sweeten the deal.
Having IoT devices collect and analyze data from sensors, lights and meters will help urban planners make decisions about improving infrastructure, services and utilities. Large groups of people create even more data, which helps cities understand why crowds form — and predict how services can meet their needs and ensure their safety. That enables the reshaping of cities to better accommodate pedestrians and improve the quality of life of citizens.
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[1] https://www.fda.gov/Food/RecallsOutbreaksEmergencies/Outbreaks/ucm568097.htm#timeline
[2] http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2015/foodborne-disease-estimates/en/
[3] https://www.cdc.gov/foodsafety/disease-type.html
[4] https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/08/solar-eclipse-employee-productivity-loss
[5] http://www.tubefilter.com/2017/08/22/nasa-eclipse-live-stream/
[6] http://www.businessinsider.com/solar-eclipse-most-shared-data-history-prediction-2017-8
[7] http://www.governing.com/columns/tech-talk/gov-government-data-cities-citizen-scientists.html
[8] https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2017/mar/21/timelapse-satellite-images-china-fastest-growing-cities
[9] https://www.citylab.com/solutions/2017/08/designing-a-megacity-for-mental-health/537423/
