The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) has awarded a £1.14 million grant to develop the ‘Internet of Food Things’ to enable the sector to harness digital advances.
The Internet of Food Things Network Plus that will bring together data and computer scientists, chemists and economists to investigate how artificial intelligence, data analytics and emerging technologies can enhance the digitalisation of the UK food supply chain.
The network, led by the University of Lincoln in partnership with the Universities of Southampton, Surrey, East Anglia and The Open University, will examine the application of the IoT in connected homes of the future, e.g. smart refrigerators that trigger a grocery order when food items run low.
It will also put an emphasis on the traceability of food and how machine learning and artificial intelligence could be utilised to extract value from the vast amounts of data available across the whole food supply chain, improving efficiency and reducing food waste.
Source: Food Manufacture