@xiti - As Japan tries to overcome the reality of wildlife overpopulation, a government ministry taps the block to streamline the meat supply chain process that will allow the final consumer to track the history of meat, from hunting grounds.

The Japan Gibier Promotion Association, a division of Japan's Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries will use blockchain to secure Japan's wild game meat supply chain. The association is in charge of overseeing the standards of wildlife hunting and culinary food distribution in Japan. It collaborates with Tech Bureau, a FinTech startup and cryptocurrency to use its Mijin, a private blockchain based on the NEM protocol. The use case marks the first instance of the Japanese government that implemented the Mijin Block.

There has been a drastic reduction of licensed hunters in Japan. Citing figures from the Ministry of the Environment, the Japan Times pointed to 198,000 hunters in Japan, down from 210,000 in 2000 and 518,000 in 1975. 66%, or 131,000 licensed hunters over 60 . Wild boar and deer populations have skyrocketed at once to cause damage to agricultural land and encroachment to human-populated areas.

Chief executive of Tech Bureau Corp. Takao Asayama sees blockchain as a more efficient solution of the wild meat supply chain in the country.

He has stated:

Some rural communities suffer from wildlife overpopulation, amounting to more than $ 178 million USD per year. The power of blockchain technology is that it can transform one of the oldest food supplies into an asset to the local community.

The blockchain will see meat data from processing plants recorded on tamper-proof ledger before being compared with traditional supply chain data. Automatic alerts are sent if both entries do not match, ensuring a transparent and traceable supply chain to supervise game meats.



Image credit: Mijin

Deployed by the Japan Gibier Promotion Association this month, the blockchain will record data including date, transit point, product name, quantity, price and more. The blockchain platform will eventually see the national launch in the future.

In the case of separate use, the Japanese conglomerate Hitachi has tested the Mijin Block for the popular PointIfinity award platform, a point management solution adopted by merchants and service providers to serve approximately 150 million members.