by Mish Shedlock, The Maven:
When dozens of people across the country got sick from eating contaminated romaine lettuce this spring, Walmart did what many grocers would do: It cleared every shred off its shelves, just to be safe.
Walmart says it now has a better system for pinpointing which batches of leafy green vegetables might be contaminated. After a two–year pilot project, the retailer announced on Monday that it would be using a blockchain, the type of database technology behind Bitcoin, to keep track of every bag of spinach and head of lettuce.
By this time next year, more than 100 farms that supply Walmart with leafy green vegetables will be required to input detailed information about their food into a blockchain database developed by I.B.M. for Walmart and several other retailers exploring similar moves.
The blockchains being tested by companies, including the version adopted by Walmart, generally have nothing to do with Bitcoin or any cryptocurrency — they are entirely new databases with no coins involved. And unlike the Bitcoin blockchain, which can be viewed by anyone, only certain people will be able to view and access the Walmart database.
The system that Walmart is using, IBM Food Trust, has been developed for consumer companies, including Dole, Wegmans and Unilever, to track products moving through the supply chain.
Not a Publicity Stunt
Some think this is a publicity stunt. Unlike Kodak’s ridiculous endeavor to sell mining machines, I don’t.
Blockchain will ultimately have many uses. I’s perfect for recording high-value, low-volume transactions like mortgages and auto loans.
Blockchain will not scale as a means of recording every sales transaction in the world.Even if I am wrong about that, there is no reason to believe Bitcoin itself will survive.
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