Having put in its initial bid for funding under the Horizon Europe Chips Joint Undertaking in mid-May the Smart Food Chain (SFC) project has announced that it has successfully passed this stage of the process. SFC can now move to the final bidding process in September and remains on track for a project start date in January 2025.
The project comprises a consortium of more than 50 companies, representing 13 EU member states, from all parts of the Supply Chain. Its aim is to reinvent food supply chains across Europe and beyond. The SFC project has been initiated by AIPIA, the Active & Intelligent Packaging Industry Association, PACKZ a Dutch-based packaging expert company and Berenschot, a major independent Dutch management consultancy. It will be coordinated by T-systems, the Germany-based digital transformation service provider.
According to the evaluation summary report received from the EU funding authority, the first proposal was rated very highly and well above the threshold needed for a successful bid. However, it pointed out certain weaknesses in the proposal, such as the need for more inclusion of innovative technologies and more quantitative KPIs or measurable targets. These will be addressed in the final bid as will a more precise description of the objectives of the project.
The summary states:
The proposal is clear in terms of the general objectives and motivations. The objectives are well-presented and in accordance with the call, stating the current situation with food packaging and credibly describing paths to reduce food packaging and food waste along the supply chain.
The different sensors and packaging materials are very comprehensive and provide a clear, global vision of the unmet social needs and the necessity to develop technologies to minimize food waste. AI and ML, required for this project, are soundly described, including robustness aspects.
The proposal goes beyond the state of the art in a multi-fold approach and the challenges to reach the proposal goals are correctly identified for all the domains proposed in the project.
Consortium members, which include many leading smart technology suppliers, as well as packaging companies and major research institutes; and several leading international food producers who will be involved as partners or affiliates, will now work on the final bid proposal.
Commenting on passing this stage of the process successfully AIPIA managing director Eef de Ferrante said, “We are very excited to have achieved such high marks in this round, including approval of the total budget of €40 million, which does include consortium member contributions. There is still some work to do, but it is clear that the EU thinks this is a very important project which addresses a critical important issue – food waste. We look forward to achieving final approval and to starting the SFC project in 2025.
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Naresh Khanna – 10 February 2025
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