Internet of Things: A review from ‘Farm to Fork’

Academic and industrial research in Internet of Things (IoT) has increased over the past several years. The Internet of Things aims to connect physical objects (Things) to the Internet using low power network connectivity that is embedded with sensors. IoT is becoming all-encompassing with “Smart” Cities, Homes, Grid, Transportation, Agriculture & Industry 4.0 just some of the application areas of IoT technology. This paper concentrates on the use of IoT technologies in the Food supply chain. The Food supply chain in the context of this paper includes agriculture, food processing, transportation & distribution right through to retail, from “Farm to Fork”. The demand for tracking, tracing and monitoring of fresh has elevated as instances of foodborne illness has increased. In this paper we attempt to contribute a review of state-of-the-art technologies and strategies that constitutes the IoT and how that applies to “Farm to Fork”. We describe the IoT's key enabling technologies including Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN), Cloud Computing and Data Analytics. We present the research trends and challenges in the food supply chain industry, mainly focusing on fresh produce such as meat, fruits & vegetables. We then present applications of IoT technologies in Food Production, Transportation & Distribution and in Food Retail. We conclude the paper with plans for future work.