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Seafood Industry Australia has been awarded a $267,000 Australian Government grant to strengthen consumer assurances in our premium seafood products.

Minister for Agriculture, Drought and Emergency Management David Littleproud and Assistant Minister for Forestry and Fisheries Jonathon Duniam said the investment would boost export opportunities through enhanced traceability.

“With this funding, Seafood Industry Australia will develop a closed loop ‘trust mark’; a visually recognisable label for packaging that can be scanned with a smartphone, like a QR code,” Minister Littleproud explained.

“This will indicate to consumers that the product they’re buying is 100 per cent traceable, Australian seafood, which they can verify digitally.”

Assistant Minister Duniam said the technology would improve opportunities to access international markets and promote Australian seafood locally.

“By deploying these trust marks, we can verify our Aussie seafood in the domestic market and shore up our brand overseas,” Assistant Minister Duniam said.

“Unfortunately, seafood is a market where fraudulent products can significantly devalue our exports, but new advancements like this will help our seafood industry to better use traceability and sustainability to set their product apart from the rest.

“This new technology will also ensure Australians can easily identify home-grown seafood, which will boost our Great Australian Seafood, Easy As, campaign that was created by Seafood Industry Australia with our $4 million investment.”

CEO of Seafood Industry Australia, Veronica Papacosta, said that the grant was a chance to build Australia’s reputation as a provider of quality seafood to both domestic and international markets.

“We’ve been working on building brand awareness within Australia of our Great Australian Seafood, and now it’s time to turn our focus to international markets,” Ms Papacosta said.

“We’re starting with a pilot program to build and test the technology. We’re hopeful it will then be rolled out to the entire industry.

“Importantly, this is technology that can be used by other industries outside of seafood. Greater traceability for Australian produce will underpin confidence in brand Australia in export markets.

“We are grateful for the continued support of the Morrison Government.”

Program Facts:

The program will pilot a digital traceability solution using Austral Fisheries Glacier51 Toothfish as the case study, leveraging Laava Smart Fingerprints® as the on-package ‘trust mark’. These are a visually recognisable code for packaging that can be scanned with a smartphone. The Fingerprint will integrate with OpenSC’s underlying supply chain transparency platform, designed to verify production practices and attach these credentials to physical products through the supply chain.

Each Laava Smart Fingerprint® is unique to every individual product. It is a serialised, scannable, on-package mark that uses patented optical technology to ensure security. Scanning each Fingerprint not only enables the user to verify authenticity of a product, but in this case seamlessly
access provenance information for Australian Seafood products.

“OpenSC is delighted to partner with Seafood Industry Australia on this project, with the shared goal of making provenance and responsible production practices a core part of Australian seafood’s value proposition in overseas markets,” OpenSC Director of Implementation Devon Long said.

“Australian fisheries are well-managed and deserve to command a premium. OpenSC’s technology platform can verify traceability, provenance and authenticity – in a data-based and automated way – helping price premiums to be realised, and also ensuring market access.

“The barrier to entry in this space can be quite high, particular for smaller and mid-sized operators, due to a relatively low level of standardisation. SIA’s leadership in this space to develop shared tools for industry will make it easier than ever for exporters to benefit from their Australian origins”

For more details on the 14 successful round two projects visit the Traceability Grants Program website.

Fast Facts:

• The Traceability Grants Program supports industry projects that will enhance our agricultural supply chain traceability systems, including developing and trialing technologies that digitise information flow.
• The program also aims to provide an advantage for our exporters and to increase opportunities to export Australian commodities.
• The program is part of the Australian Government’s Modernising Agricultural Trade agenda to support the target of a $100 billion agricultural sector by 2030.
• The Australian Government is investing $7 million from 2019-20 through to the end of 2022-23 in projects under the Traceability Grants.

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Media contacts:

Seafood Industry Australia – Jessica McInerney, 0420 695 431

Minister Littelproud – Douglas Ferguson, 0455 448 985

Assistant Minister Dunaim – Carla Howarth, 0499 037 732