Recommendations For New Or Updated Standards D50042 FIspace D500.4.2

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Deliverable D500.4.2

Recommendations for new or updated standards
WP500

Project Acronym & Number:

FIspace – 604 123

Project Title:

FIspace: Future Internet Business Collaboration
Networks in Agri-Food, Transport and Logistics

Funding Scheme:

Collaborative Project - Large-scale Integrated Project
(IP)

Date of latest version of Annex 1:
Start date of the project:

01.04.2013

Duration:

24

Status:

Final

Authors:

Esther Mietzsch, Andreas Füßler, Sabine Kläser, Henk
Zwinkels, Daniel Martini, Daan Goense, Christopher
Brewster

Contributors:

Tim Bartram, Heritiana Ranaivoson

Document Identifier:

FIspace-D50042_final.docx

Date:

2015-02-27

Revision:

007

Project website address:

www.cSpace.eu // www.FIspace.eu

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The FIspace Project
Leveraging on outcomes of two complementary Phase 1 use case projects (FInest & SmartAgriFood), aim
of FIspace is to pioneer towards fundamental changes on how collaborative business networks will work in
future. FIspace will develop a multi-domain Business Collaboration Space (short: FIspace) that employs FI
technologies for enabling seamless collaboration in open, cross-organizational business networks, establish eight working Experimentation Sites in Europe where Pilot Applications are tested in Early Trials for
Agri-Food, Transport & Logistics and prepare for industrial uptake by engaging with players & associations
from relevant industry sectors and IT industry.

Project Summary
As a use case project in Phase 2 of the FI PPP, FIspace aims at developing and validating novel FutureInternet-enabled solutions to address the pressing challenges arising in collaborative business networks,
focussing on use cases from the Agri-Food, Transport and Logistics industries. FIspace will focus on exploiting, incorporating and validating the Generic Enablers provided by the FI PPP Core Platform with the
aim of realising an extensible collaboration service for business networks together with a set of innovative
test applications that allow for radical improvements in how networked businesses can work in the future.
Those solutions will be demonstrated and tested through early trials on experimentation sites across Europe. The project results will be open to the FI PPP program and the general public, and the pro-active
engagement of larger user communities and external solution providers will foster innovation and industrial
uptake planned for Phase 3 of the FI PPP.

Project Consortium
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DLO; Netherlands
ATB Bremen; Germany
IBM; Israel
KocSistem; Turkey
Aston University; United Kingdom
ENoLL; Belgium
KTBL; Germany
NKUA; Greece
Wageningen University; Netherlands
PlusFresc; Spain
FloriCode; Netherlands
Kverneland; Netherlands
North Sea Container Line; Norway
LimeTri; Netherlands
BO-MO; Slovenia
MOBICS; Greece
Fraunhofer IML; Germany
Q-ray; Netherlands
FINCONS; Italy

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Kühne + Nagel; Switzerland
University Duisburg Essen; Germany
ATOS; Spain
The Open Group; United Kingdom
CentMa; Germany
iMinds; Belgium
Marintek; Norway
University Politecnica Madrid; Spain
Arcelik; Turkey
EuroPoolSystem; Germany
GS1 Germany; Germany
Mieloo & Alexander; Netherlands
OPEKEPE; Greece
Innovators; Greece
CIT; Spain
SDZ; Germany
Snoopmedia; Germany
EECC; Germany
CBT; Spain

More Information
Dr. Sjaak Wolfert (coordinator)
LEI Wageningen UR

e-mail:
phone:

sjaak.wolfert@wur.nl
+31 317 485 939

Harald Sundmaeker (deputy coordinator)
ATB Bremen GmbH

e-mail:
phone:

sundmaeker@atb-bremen.de
+49 421 220920

FIspace website:

www.FIspace.eu

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Dissemination Level
PU

Public

x

PP

Restricted to other programme participants (including the Commission Services)

RE

Restricted to a group specified by the consortium (including the Commission Services)

CO

Confidential, only for members of the consortium (including the Commission Services)

Change History
Version

Notes

Date

001

Creation of the document

10.11.2014

002

Preliminary outline

003

Draft version of introduction, outline of chapters

19.12.2014

004

Draft version of main chapters

14.01.2015

005

Added input from trial

21.01.2015

006

Complete version

06.02.2015

007

Final version

27.02.1015

Document Summary
This document summarizes the recommendations made as result of the Sub-Task 542 “Recommendations,
collaboration and dissemination”. The use of standards in each trial has been evaluated with a focus on
how products, business partners and locations are identified. Based on the gap analysis, recommendations
for future work were made. As a conclusion, open standards, a focus of interoperability and the implementation of Linked Open Data are recommended.

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Abbreviations
AEF

Agricultural Electronics Foundation

i.e.

id est = that is to say

API

Application Programming Interface

IP

Intellectual Property

IPR

Intellectual Property Rights

App

Software Application

JAXB

Java Architecture for XML Binding

AS2

Applicability Statement 2 (a
data transport specification)

JSON

JavaScript Object Notation

D

Deliverable

KPI

Key Performance Indicator

Database of Origin and Registration

M

Month

DOOR

OGC

Open Geospatial Consortium

DoW

Description of Work

PDO

Protected Designation of Origin

EC

European Commission

PGI

e.g.

Exempli gratia = for example

Protected Geographical Indication

ELS

Electronic Logistic Status

RDF

Resource Description Framework

EPB

Electronic Packing List

RFID

Radio-Frequency Identification

EPCIS

Electronic Product Code Information Services

RTD

Research and Technological
Development

ERP

Enterprise resource planning

RTI

Returnable Transport Item

ETO

Electronic Transport Order

SDK

Software Development Kit

EU

European Union

SGLN

Serialised GLN

FAO

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

SGTIN

Serialised GTIN

FIA

Future Internet Assembly

SME

Small and Medium Sized Enterprise

FI PPP

Future Internet Public Private
Partnership

SOAP

Simple Object Access Protocol

FMIS

Farm Management Information
Systems

SPARQL

SPARQL Protocol and RDF
Query Language

FP7

Framework Programme 7

SSCC

Serial Shipping Container Code

GA

Grant Agreement

ST

Sub-Task

Global Returnable Asset Identifier

T

Task

GRAI

TSG

Traditional specialities guaranteed

URL

Uniform resource locator

VBN

Vereniging van Bloemenveilingen in Nederland (Dutch),
Dutch Flower Auctions Association

VVVO

Europäische Viehverkehrsordnung (German), European Livestock Movement Order

WP

Work Package

XML

Extensible Markup Language

GDSN

Global Data Synchronisation
Network

GML

Geography Markup Language

GPC

Global Product Classification

GLN

Global Location Number

GTIN

Global Trade Item Number

HI-Tier

Herkunftssicherungs- und Informationssystem für Tiere (German), Identification and Information System for Animals

HTTP

Hypertext Transfer Protocol

ICT

Information and Communication
Technology

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Table of Contents
1

Introduction ....................................................................................................................................... 7
1.1

Purpose and content ................................................................................................................ 7

1.2

Approach to standardisation process ....................................................................................... 7

2

Use of standards in the trials .......................................................................................................... 8
2.1

Comments on D500.4.1 “Guidelines for the use of standards in FIspace” .............................. 8

2.2

Use of identifiers ....................................................................................................................... 8

2.3

Problems concerning the use of standards or access to standards....................................... 10

3

FIspace initiatives impacting standardisation ............................................................................. 11
3.1

Arable farming ........................................................................................................................ 11

3.1.1

Developments in and demand from industry .......................................................................... 11

3.1.2

Existing Approaches ............................................................................................................... 12

3.1.3

Implementation and Alignment Path ...................................................................................... 13

3.2

Improvements in data exchange in the Dutch flower chain .................................................... 13

3.2.1

Business collaboration for the logistics in the supply chain of flowers & plants ..................... 13

3.2.2

Floricode develops standards for the logistics ....................................................................... 13

3.2.3

Process model ........................................................................................................................ 14

3.2.4

Standard messages ................................................................................................................ 15

3.2.5

Logistic code lists ................................................................................................................... 16

3.2.6

Logistic labels ......................................................................................................................... 16

3.3

Capturing and storing ambient data during transport ............................................................. 16

3.4

EU Geographical indications and traditional specialities ........................................................ 19

3.5

Improvements in the Meat Supply Chain ............................................................................... 20

3.6

Fish logistic data ..................................................................................................................... 23

4

Conclusions .................................................................................................................................... 23
4.1

Open standards / Open Supply Chains .................................................................................. 23

4.2

Interoperability ........................................................................................................................ 24

4.3

Use of available Linked Open Data resources on food and agriculture ................................. 25

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List of Figures
Figure 1. The actors and logistic locations in the supply chain of potted plants .......................... 14
Figure 2: Logistic processes in the supply chain of flowers & plants ........................................... 15
Figure 3: Logistic label for a package of plants ........................................................................... 16
Figure 4: Showcase systematic IT structure ................................................................................ 17
Figure 5: Overview on Fosstrak EPCIS System .......................................................................... 18
Figure 6: Clients with temperature, humidity and luminosity ....................................................... 18
Figure 7: Geographical Indications – PDO; PGI and TSG........................................................... 19
Figure 8: Scheme of Meat supply chain ....................................................................................... 21
Figure 9: Example of an eartag ID ............................................................................................... 22
Figure 10: Screen Shot MIP Aggregation App ............................................................................. 22
Figure 11: Fish supply chain ........................................................................................................ 23
Figure 12: The Linking Open Data cloud diagram ....................................................................... 25

List of Tables
Table 1: Structure of questionnaire ................................................................................................ 7
Table 2: Identifiers and standards used in each trial ..................................................................... 8
Table 3: Structure of DOOR database ......................................................................................... 19

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1 Introduction
1.1

Purpose and content

This document covers Deliverable D500.4.2 “Recommendations for new or updated Standards”. Therefore
it is a report with a formulation of proposals towards developments in standards. It is one of three deliverables describing the outcome of Task 540: “Standardization”, which aims to ensure standards are used
throughout the FIspace project and to identify where standards need to be modified or extended. The other
deliverables are


D500.4.1 Guidelines to use of Standards in FIspace (available since M3), which provided a review of
the relevant standards.



D500.4.3 Activities and results of the validation with other standardisation organisations and relevant
networks (due in M24)
The focus of this document is on the results of Sub-Task 542 “Recommendations, collaboration and dissemination” which examined whether additional standards and specifications will be required for the implementation and roll-out of FIspace. Outputs from the individual trials were collected to identify requirements for changes and improvements in existing standards.
This document is also a follow-up of Deliverable D 600.2 “Plan for standardisation for large scale experimentation” of the Phase I project SmartAgriFood. The recommendations made in the earlier document
are addressed also in this document.
The first part of this document evaluates how standards are used in each trial.
There are eight use case trials (subtasks = ST), organized along three themes:
 T 420 Farming in the Cloud
o ST 421 Crop protection Information Sharing
o ST 422 Greenhouse Management & Control
 T 430 Intelligent Perishable Goods Logistics
o ST 431 Fish Distribution (Re)Planning
o ST 432 Fresh Fruit & Vegetables Quality Assurance
o ST 433 Flowers & Plants Chain Monitoring


T440 Smart Distribution and Consumption
o ST 441 Meat Information Provenance
o ST 442 Import and Export of Consumer Goods
o ST 443 Tailored Information for Consumers
In the next part, gaps are analysed and recommendations for further work are made, which will lead to an
improvement of standards in practical use. Finally, more general recommendations for the use of standards are made.

1.2

Approach to standardisation process

The basis of this document is the use of data standards in the trials and their needs for formats and protocols to exchange data. In order to collect the input from the trials and to learn about their experiences, a
questionnaire was sent to all trial leads or the responsible technical contact.
Table 1: Structure of questionnaire
ID

Question

1.

Do you have any questions or comments on D500.4.1 Guidelines for the use of Standards in
FIspace?

2.

Please give us access to the API or documentation of your trial or point us to it on OwnCloud
(xml schema, or even code, etc.).

3.

Are you planning to use the baseline apps developed by WP 450?

4.

Are you using any standards in designing your API or naming data field (If yes which ones)?

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5.

Are you using any identifiers for product batches or individual items? If so what is the system?

6.

How are you identifying business partners and locations in your API?

7.

Are there any issues regarding access to information on standards?

8.

Did you experience any problems referring to standards or specifications?

Based on the outcome of this questionnaire, gaps where no standards exist were identified and possible
solutions to fill these gaps were analysed. Additionally, ad hoc-solutions which were realised during the trial
implementation led to proposals for new standards. The analysis focused on the trials related to agriculture
and the food chain. This focus is caused mainly by the availabilty of expert on this domain.

2 Use of standards in the trials
This chapter summarizes the results of a questionnaire, which has been issued to all trials.

2.1

Comments on D500.4.1 “Guidelines for the use of standards in FIspace”

In general, these guidelines are accepted, and the trial partners plan to use related e-business, identification
and communication standards whenever possible.
The trial on Transparency in the Meat Supply Chain (Meat Information on Provenance, MIP) for instance is
based on the EPCIS Standard cited in D500.4.1 with its new features Instance/Lot Master Data and Transformation Event. This enables all business partners involved to refer to individual items as well as to groups
of items with the same parameter values like the same lot number. Identification of locations and parties
with a (Serialized) Global Location Number (SGLN) and Products (SGTIN), including medicine identification
in case an animal has been treated with it, build the unique reference to Products, Parties and Locations.
The VVVO Number (Cattle Identification System) is inherently part of the GLN and country of origin and
can be derived on demand. It is worth mentioning that also living animals are identified by their unique
SGTIN.
In the Flower and Plant supply chain worldwide growers, auctions, traders (importers, exporters and their
customers), carriers and governmental organizations are using the Floricode (semantic) standards that
partly consists of GS1 Standards cited in D500.4.1. The participants in Flowers and Plants Supply Chain
Monitoring trial are also using these standards in their (ERP) applications. New functionality that will be
developed within this trial needs to connect to these existing standards and systems to ensure the usefulness of the trial in practice. For this trial project Floricode is developing and improving the standard messages to support the logistic processes in the supply chain. Together with GS1 Netherlands a recommendation for the labelling of the logistic units (trolleys) based on the use of the SSCC coding is under development. This might lead into requests for improving the GS1 Standards globally accordingly.
According to the Fresh Fruit & Vegetables Quality Assurance the enumerated standards on master data
and master data communication are not explained as explicitly as needed for the trial app development.
Additional sources such as the standards themselves must be referred to.

2.2

Use of identifiers

For each trial, the use of identifiers is described in Table 2. The second column describes how the data
fields are structured and relates to the standards used for this. The third column gives the standards or data
formats for the product itself, the last column those for the business partners involved in the relevant supply
chain.
Table 2: Identifiers and standards used in each trial
Trial

Standards in designing the API or naming
data field

Product batches / individual
items

Business partners and locations

ST
421
Crop Protection

drmCrop

Global Unique Identifier
(GUID), based on ISO15459.

Business Partners are
identified by the GUID.

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Information
Sharing

ST
422
Greenhouse
Management
and Control

drmCrop

Structure and definition of
that identifier in the package
DataTypes of drmCrop and
the
corresponding
xsd
schema for datatypes.

Business Partner’s will be
a Party in the drmCrop reference model and can either be a person or an organization. The latter can
be a “father” organization
(for example Holding) of
“children” (for example departments). A Party has a
GUID, so the business
partner is identified by the
GUID.

URI based identifiers with following setup:

Same as Crop Protection
Information Sharing

[Issuing agency]/[enterprise
id]/[Item type]/[item id]
For example for a CropField
this could be:
ANL/12345678/CFD/1234

ST
431
Fish Distribution
and (Re-) Planning

Data model for bookings derived from the
stakeholder’s Softship
installation

Global
(GUID)

Unique

Identifier

Business Partners are
identified by GUID. Locations are encoded in longitude and latitude by decimal degrees. Ports are
identified by their port
codes.

GTIN for identifying type of
box in Europool app, GRAI
for individual boxes.

Cf. Product batches / individual items

Data exchange between legacy applications and CargoSwApp by Excel files
ST
432
Fresh Fruit and
Vegetables
Quality Assurance

Pilot Implementation
Guide for Masterdata
in the Fruit and Vegetable Business, provided by GS1
Other standards for
identifying the deliveries in PIA

ST
433
Flowers
and
Plants Supply
Chain Monitoring

Partners (e.g. growers) are identified via
GLN,
products
(plants) via GTIN, trolleys via GRAI and logistic units (based on
lots) via SSCC. EPC
will also be used since
events are planned to
be communicated via
EPCIS compatible interfaces.

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GLIN and Global Gap numbers for identifying farmer
(not everyone has both).
There is also company identification number from Ministries for agriculture e.g. DPA
in Netherlands for fruit companies, etc.
In data communication in our
supply chain the VBN article
numbering system is the
leading standard worldwide
for product identification in
the sense of classification.
For certain types of products
(garden plants) the use of
GTINs starts to develop, although customers (like retail
and garden centres) are not
often demanding this code
type up until now. With the
new GTIN guide and the
GPC for Plants and Flowers
in place a rise in the demand

GLN for partner and location identification

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of the unique GTIN is expected.

ST
Meat
mation
nance

441
InforProve-

EPCIS is used to capture and retrieve event
data within the meat
supply chain. Partners
are
identified
via
(S)GLN and products
via (S)GTIN. EPC is
used to communicate
all events via EPCIS.
Additional references
and terms will be
based on GDD explanations and definitions.

GS1
article
numbering
schemes: GLN and GTIN for
master data, LGTIN /SGTIN
(Serialized GTIN) and SGLN
for event related data. VVVO
number as basis for capture
of birth events.

GS1 partner and location
numbering schemes: GLN
for partner identification,
SGLN for more granularity
such as read point identification.

ST
442
Import and Export of Consumer Goods

Data
model
for
transport demand web
app and the shipment
status mo-bile app derived from the LPA Solution in order to ensure the integration
between these modules

Global Unique Identifier
(GUID), based on ISO15459.

The Business Entities are
identified by GUID standard. In the Shipment Status Mobile App and in the
Manual Event & Deviation
Reporting App the checkpoint details associated to
location data are encoded
in longitude and latitude by
decimal degrees.

Data exchange between legacy applications (SAP Extraction
– Order item inputs for
the transport Demand) and Transport
Demand Web Application by Excel files
ST
443
Tailored Information for Consumers

Partners are identified
via GLN and products
via GTIN. EPC will be
used for identifying
products
and/or
batches (events) and
will be communicated
via EPCIS compatible
interfaces (mainly mobile phones).

Receiver, Sender, Item are
identified by codes provided by SAP system.
Pick Up and delivery location (Ports details) are
identified by their codes.
For packed non-fresh products: GTIN, for fresh products
(vegetables, fruit, daily products, etc): internal EPCIS.

GLN for partner and location identification

Product data structure is built on xml and
data field names are
based on GDSN from
GS1.

2.3

Problems concerning the use of standards or access to standards

In general, the trial partners had little or no issues regarding access to information on standards. Software
developers seem to be familiar with the standards relevant to their field. However ST 431 the trial “Fish

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Distribution and (Re-)Planning” reports a lack of information from from the baseline apps and the platformon
the standards used by them.
Regarding the use of standards, the trial developers reported a number of issues, such as lacking continuity
and compatibility and cross-sectorial differences. In detail, the following gaps were identified:


ISO11783 deviates from OGC/gml, gives wrong interpretation of some Time types and is (too) abstract on some aspects. Corrections or improvements are rejected for reasons of backward compatibility.



Within OGC; gml and ISO19123 are not in line. Gml uses identical names for some complex elements, resulting in errors by JAXB compilers, which must be overcome by special binding files.



Issue of the data exchange of actual data of temperature, humidity and radiation measured with intelligent RFID chips on locations and during transport to be able to combine these data with scanning
data. The Plants and Flowers Trial (ST 433) requires the capture of ambient data like temperature or
humidity. EPCIS serves as a basis for the trial. But since ambient data are not event related they
were not in the development of EPCIS focus so far. A general approach to solve this issue was developed within the trial (see 3.3).



Registration numbers demanded by authorities like the German VVVO Number for the identification
of farms or the ear tag number should be aligned with identification schemes relevant for B2B or B2C
business. In the Meat Information on Transparency Trial (MIP, ST 441) an approach towards an integration of the ear tag number into the GTIN has been developed (see 3.5).



No standard for the description of Geographical indications and traditional specialities (see 3.4)

3 FIspace initiatives impacting standardisation
3.1

Arable farming

Technically, it is possible to capture a considerable amount of data already on-farm in primary production
using either stationary sensor devices, logging facilities on mobile agricultural equipment or data captured
by mobile phones. However, only part of this data can be turned into useful information in the business
context, mostly due to lack of interfaces that are extensible and flexible enough to accommodate individual
user’s needs and environment and to allow for merging a number of data sources. Evaluation and data
interpretation logic building upon that infrastructure fails in that it can often only cover specific use cases
and misses important information that would be relevant for adequate decision support in a heterogeneous
environment.

3.1.1

Developments in and demand from industry

In parallel to the activities within the FIspace project, companies within the agricultural industry and machinery construction sector and farm management information system providers alike have realized the
potential that lies in integration of existing data sources, capturing and evaluation of mass data and provision of service networks and frameworks, that allow users to flexibly combine modules and/or apps to an
ecosystem tailored to their needs.
Apart from FIspace, several initiatives worldwide have therefore started out to develop and provide cloud
FMISes, data capturing and distribution platforms like telemetry systems or web based open sensor networks for e. g. weather data and modular app frameworks including SDKs for partners to implement their
own modules. There is however also a growing awareness, that farmers’ needs can only be satisfied by
networking several systems. As a consequence, an increasing number of system providers have started to
provide APIs. Currently, a number of solutions are built using ReSTful web services (REST: a set of architectural principles for web services, e.g. use of the HTTP methods POST and GET) and JSON as a serialization format, however there are also approaches that lean towards different technologies for a number of
reasons, e. g. using POST against a single service URL or using other serialization formats like XML or
more efficient binary encodings. Especially within the agricultural machinery sector, there is also considerable effort to enable the most important existing standard for tractor-implement communication, the ISOBUS (ISO 11783) for internet based communication and to reuse experience and components created
there.
None of the publicly available specifications in production services currently uses semantic technologies in
the strict sense of the word (which would mean e. g. basing the APIs on an open lightweight, graph-oriented
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agricultural knowledge model and auto-generating interfaces based on that semantic network). Although
matters regarding ease of exchanging data and networking between different systems have improved considerably, real data integration, mapping data content between different systems’ interpretations and creating holistic data views in interfaces for the users still requires a considerable amount of bilateral discussions, agreements and engineering and programming efforts.

3.1.2
3.1.2.1

Existing Approaches
API Standardization/Recommendation Efforts

ISO 11783 and 16867: Currently, within ISO SC19 WG5, standardization efforts are conducted on a component called the agricultural activity server, which should enable providing planned- and capturing realized
working tasks, collecting sensor data from agricultural fields and in the future also information on grazing
animals at a central entity for requests and distribution.
Agricultural Electronics Foundation (AEF): The AEF is an association consisting mainly of representatives
from agricultural machinery industry and management and control software systems and electronics providers. It maintains a project group (PG9) dealing with farm management system issues and is currently
working on interfaces to enable cloud based systems to interact with mobile farm equipment. By member
overlap, there is a direct relation to the ISO 11783 committees, i. e. approaches developed in AEF are for
the parts, for which it makes sense, likely to be carried on into the ISO. Some partners in FIspace are also
members of the AEF. Based on demand and requirements, specifications from FIspace may be discussed,
improved and – depending on outcome – standardized via ISO through this path.
AgGateway: AgGateway is an US American association defining its role mainly in recommending existing
standards to use to facilitate business communication in agriculture but also to a certain degree conducting
pilot projects to draft new solutions. Together with John Deere, AgGateway is currently working on the
ADAPT APIs (see e. g. http://infoag.org/abstract_papers/papers/paper_257.pdf). There are a number of
sound concepts developed within these projects like e. g. ISOBUS XML to JSON conversion rules for webservice operation. On the other hand approaches also seem to differ from the paths taken in Europe, e. g.
with regard to using the AEMP telematics protocol that plays no significant role in agricultural telematics
systems in Europe. Also, there is a certain overlap in members of AgGateway and AEF, thus facilitating
exchange between these organizations.
OpenAg Data Alliance: The Open Ag data alliance is a relatively new organization (activities can be tracked
roughly until mid 2014) founded in the US, also promising to provide agricultural APIs. Members seem to
be mainly agricultural software and data providers but also including industry players like Monsanto.
EDI-Teelt version 4: AgroConnect is responsible for standardisation of agricultural information exchange in
the Netherlands. These standards are based on SOAP web services using XML elements. For crop production these elements are based on a common reference data model drmCrop. At this moment web services are defined for: Cropping schemes, Advice, Laboratory results and Crop production specification.

3.1.2.2

APIs provided by companies

Here, only some of the most notable and publicly visible efforts are described with no claim for completeness nor endorsement for or against a specific implementation. Activities include the ones conducted by
John Deere in the US around the myjohndeere.com platform and in Europe around the 365farmnet.com
platform. Both provide API interfaces and specifications or parts/drafts thereof have been circulated among
people involved in standardization in AEF or AgGateway. Implementations are based on ReSTful web services to be called via HTTP.

3.1.2.3

Agricultural Knowledge Models

Already more than a decade ago, farm management system providers discussed potentials of a common
data exchange format accompanied by a flexible, extensible knowledge model, an ontology of agriculture.
These activities resulted in agroXML being developed in Germany. The exchange format was based on
XML and there have been efforts to create an ontology in parallel, describing semantic meanings of data
items. However, a technological analysis at the time of creation of agroXML revealed, that there were neither tools nor ontology specification methods available, that were able to fulfil the cross-platform, crossprogramming environment requirements necessary to cover the variety of agricultural software systems.
With more recent semantic web developments and simple, but powerful graph representation formats like

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RDF including programming libraries and tools available in almost any major programming language being
available, the situation has improved considerably. That resulted in efforts within the German iGreen project
to create a semantic knowledge model of agriculture called agroRDF, that would allow for multiple serialization formats to be generated out of a single model, for easily created extensions, even beyond arable
farming only, multilingual support by using standard RDF constructs and that reuses existing standards and
vocabularies and provides for a standardized mapping mechanism against existing APIs and data formats.
The most notable problem around agroRDF is currently its lack of documentation, examples and tutorials
and prototype implementations.
On the other hand, in the Netherlands the drmCrop-Model has been developed, also covering most of
arable farming and worked out to a high level of detail. drmCrop is currently bound to a fixed toolchain using
Enterprise Architect as the interface to create the model and generate serializations and API interfaces.
Although its use is thus limited to a certain set of environments, the use of GUI tool provides an easy path
to dive into the model and derive other implementations.

3.1.3

Implementation and Alignment Path

The most promising approach to alignment probably lies within strengthening the activities within the AEF
on creation of web based APIs and interfaces for agriculture. Major stakeholders – also from FIspace – are
represented within the committees there and there is a chance of aligning European initiatives with efforts
undertaken abroad. While currently, the awareness of advantages of a knowledge model based approach
is not yet developed to a high enough degree, eventually, an introduction of these concepts within work
conducted at AEF might drive industry and companies to pick up methods that would allow for much more
lightweight implementation and facilitated development using semantic technologies.

3.2
3.2.1

Improvements in data exchange in the Dutch flower chain
Business collaboration for the logistics in the supply chain of flowers &
plants

The logistic processes in the supply chain of flowers & plants cause a large part of the total costs of the
products. Before a bunch of flowers (or a potted plant) reaches the consumer this bunch has passed
through a number of logistic steps in the international supply chain. From the original producer who might
be located in Kenya or Ethiopia to the airport in Nairobi, a flight to Amsterdam, transport to the wholesaler
located at a Dutch auction, road transport again to an importer in a country like Norway and finally to the
flower shop in Bergen or Oslo. Apart from all these logistic steps flowers & plants are extremely vulnerable
and have a short lifespan with a vase life after harvesting of on average 10 days. This means that all these
steps have to take place in a few days in the most effective way.

3.2.2

Floricode develops standards for the logistics

Floricode develops and maintains standard business models, business ‘languages’, electronic messages
and code lists for all partners who are involved in the logistic processes in the supply chain like producers,
marketplaces (the auctions), traders, logistic service providers and carriers. These standards give opportunities for these partners to set up effective ways of business collaboration with electronic messaging with
their business partners to improve the logistic processes. A platform like FIspace can support this business
collaboration.
For more information see:
http://www.floricode.com/en-us/standardization.aspx
The technical specifications of the standards are available mostly in English, although some older documents might only be available in the Dutch language.
As part of this trial project of FIspace Floricode together with GS1 Netherlands and several business partners from the industry developed a new standard for the logistic label to be used in the supply chain of
Flowers & Plants (see § 3.2.6). This new standard was introduced officially on the yearly relation day of
Floricode on January 23 2015:
(http://www.floricode.com/Default.aspx?tabid=86&novusact=viewarticle&articleid=34).

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Also the latest version of the standard messages for the logistic domain (see § 3.2.4) were developed and
published on Floricode’s website:
http://www.floricode.com/nl-nl/partijen/softwareleverancier/softwaredevelopmentkit(sdk)/xmldocumentatiemethodiek/xmllogistiek.aspx
Software developers can make use of our Test Center to test the implementation of these logistic standard
messages:
http://www.floricode.com/en-us/partijen/softwareleverancier/testcenter.aspx
Code list (see § 3.2.5) are available both on the website and on the FTP site. A username and password
are necessary to get access to these code lists:
http://www.floricode.com/en-us/distribution/downloadingcodes.aspx

3.2.3

Process model

Standardization starts with the setup of a general process model for the international supply chain of flowers
& plants. The actors and logistic locations involved can be presented as follows:

Figure 1. The actors and logistic locations in the supply chain of potted plants
Next step is to define the logistic processes and the information flows between the partners involved. Partners in logistic processes have a role as consigner, consignee, logistic agent and/or carrier.

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LOGISTIC AGENT/
CARRIER

Logistic planning

CONSIGNER

Transport
offer

Planning
Product
logistics
Logistic
Planning

Package
planning

Planning
package
logistics

Package
agreement

Transport
planning

Package
order

Transport
planning

Transport
order
Transport
selling

Transport
purchasing
Package
planning

Package
order

Despatch
message

Despatch
message
Transport
Handling

Status
message

Logistic
planning

Logistic
planning
Package offer

Transport
selling

Transport
Handling

Planning
Product
logistics

Transport
agreement

Offering
Package
services

Transport
order

Package
planning

Product
Order
handling

Logistic
planning

Package
agreement

Transport
purchasing

Transport
offer

Offering
logistic
services

Package offer

Planning
package
logistics

Transport
planning

Logistic operation

Transport
agreement

CONSIGNEE

Transport
operation

Transport
Handling

Transport
Handling
Status
message

Product
Order
handling

Figure 2: Logistic processes in the supply chain of flowers & plants
In the phase of logistic planning, most of the time there will be no exchange of electronic data. Consigners
and consignees can ask logistic agents and carriers for their offers both for logistic services as well as for
package services. In this supply chain logistic agents (like the auctions) and carriers can offer services to
stock and deliver RTI’s for their customers. Both consigners and consignees (e.g. producers and exporters)
need RTI’s and single-use packaging to perform their logistic processes. Based on these offers consigners
and consignees will come to agreements or contracts how they will cooperate and execute the logistic
processes in the operational phase.

3.2.4

Standard messages

In the operational phase of the logistic processes a data exchange based on standard messages will
become common business in the supply chain of flowers & plants. Floricode has developed three specific
logistic electronic messages bases on the UN/CEFACT EbXML standards:






The Electronic Transport Order (ETO):
o Consigner or consignee can send an order for the execution of a consignment to his logistic agent or carrier
o The order will be acknowledged by the logistic agent/carrier
o The order will be planned by the logistic agent/carrier
o The order can be changed or withdrawn
o The same is applicable for the order of package services like the delivering of RTI’s
The Electronic Packing List (EPB):
o Based on the ETO and the original purchase order of the customer the definitive composition of the complete consignment with the exact loading of all the load carriers with
(SSCC) codes, lot numbers, packing list numbers etc. is exchanged from consigner to
carrier and consignee.
o The consignee has the opportunity to send an EPB-delivery advice to the consigner in
advance to demand for the exact loading of the different products on the load carriers.
o The EPB can be changed or withdrawn.
The Electronic Logistic Status (ELS):
o All the partners involved in the execution of each transport order can deliver actual status
information to the other partners; some relevant statuses are:
 Ready for pickup

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






3.2.5

Exception
Planned transport
Pickup done
Delivered
Hub in
Hub out

Logistic code lists

Floricode develops and maintains a relevant code list which must be used in the electronic data exchange
for logistic processes mentioned above. All companies involved in the supply chain have a Global Location
Number (GLN) company code and all relevant logistic locations for loading and unloading shipments have
a GLN. Floricode also maintains a code list for RTI types and packaging types which are in use in this
supply chain.

3.2.6

Logistic labels

Up to now the ‘auction packing list’ is used as the standard to support the execution of almost all the logistic
processes in the Dutch supply chain. Because of the internationalization of the supply chain in the last
years it is of importance to have a general international standard for the use of logistic labels. Therefore
Floricode together with GS1 has developed an implementation guideline for the use of standard logistic
labels (with SSCC codes) for the logistic processes in the supply chain of flowers & plants
(http://www.floricode.com/en-us/coding/floriculturelogisticlabel.aspx).

Figure 3: Logistic label for a package of plants

3.3

Capturing and storing ambient data during transport

The plants and flowers supply chain is a good example for the need of ambient data on every step of the
supply chain. As described in the process model in chapter 3.2.3 the path from the grower to the consumer comprises several steps. Nonetheless, consumers want to have fresh and high quality flowers. A
quality management system capturing and documenting ambient data like humidity, temperature or luminosity can help to monitor storage and transport condition and avoid deterioration or spoilage of the
plants and flowers and thus help to save resources.

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This implies the data must be captured, stored in a semantically consistent manner and communicated
via standardised interfaces. To meet these requirements a showcase based on EPCIS and implemented
on a small single board computer (“Raspberry Pi”) was developed. This computer provides several communication interfaces to establish connection between the physical and the digital world.

Figure 4: Showcase systematic IT structure
In the scenario sensors capturing temperature, humidity and luminosity were attached to the Raspberry Pi
in order to document these quality determining data during transport. The computer also allows for decoding barcodes or RFID tags through a reader connected via Bluetooth. This allows for the linkage between
the captured data and the product ID (GTIN) or the ID of the logistic unit (SSCC) or the RTI (GRAI). The
documented data can be shared in FI based systems like FIspace and checked against the optimal data,
either by a person or by means of an automated alert system.
In case the conditions do not meet the requirements of the flowers and plants, the lorry driver can be informed and he can act accordingly. During loading and unloading processes the SSCC should be decoded and condition data should be communicated through the system.
These fine granular data captured during transport and storage allows for ex post data analysis e.g.: on
the transport duration, external impacts and the quality of the products. To guarantee semantic interoperability of this cross-company communication it is based on GS1 Standards: Event data structures are EPCIS compliant and the capture and query interfaces for interactions with EPCIS repositories are standardised as well. Moreover the events are communicated via XML as also defined in EPCIS. This allows for
the combination of numerous technologies and application systems such as ERP, Supply Chain Management or Warehouse Management systems. Events like the transport of flowers or temperature measurement are captured according to the four dimensions “what, when, where and why?” and documented in

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an EPCIS repository. For data transfer the EPCIS repository uses HTTP in the capture interface. The
query interface exploits SOAP, XML via AS2 and XML via HTTP(S). The free of charge EPCIS Fosstrak
System and three sensors and a touch display were installed on the Raspberry Pi (see Figure 5 ).

Figure 5: Overview on Fosstrak EPCIS System

Figure 6: Clients with temperature, humidity and luminosity
In all, the combination of the Raspberry Pi accompanying the products during transport and capturing ambient data and reporting the real-time data to a system via standardised interfaces and in a standardised
semantic allows for low-cost quality monitoring of plants and products and can add to less quality decrease in the domain.

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EU Geographical indications and traditional specialities

Three EU schemes known as PDO (protected designation of origin), PGI (protected geographical indication) and TSG (traditional speciality guaranteed) promote and protect names of quality agricultural products
and foodstuffs.

Figure 7: Geographical Indications – PDO; PGI and TSG (Source: http://ec.europa.eu/agriculture/quality/schemes/index_en.htm)
The registration procedure involves three main steps: application, publication and registration. The user
can find out which product names are registered or have been applied for in the DOOR database (“Database of Origin and Registration). The DOOR database (link: http://ec.europa.eu/agriculture/quality/door/list.html) is openly available. It can be browsed in a web interface or downloaded as an Excel sheet
with the following fields:
Table 3: Structure of DOOR database
Field name

Comment

Searchable
and sortable in
web interface

Dossier Number
Designation

x
Name, e.g. “Stornoway Black Pudding”

Country

x
x

ISO
Status

Applied
Published
Registered

Type

PDO - Protected Designation of Origin

x

PGI - Protected Geographical Indication
TSG - Traditional Speciality Guaranteed
Last relevant date

The date when the current status was acquired

x

Product Category

e.g. “2.1 Beer”

x

Latin Transcription

Needed for e.g. Greek product names

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Submission date
Publication date
Registration date
1st Amendment date
2nd Amendment date
3rd Amendment date
The database contains a few multi-country entries, which refer to meat products from the Slovak Republic
and Czech Republic.
Each entry links to the official documents for publication and registration.
The publication document covers the relevant information for the product in a number of paragraphs followed by free text. The documents are available as PDF in 22 official languages. The ‘BAYERISCHE
BREZE’/‘BAYERISCHE BREZN’/‘BAYERISCHE BREZ’N’/‘BAYERISCHE BREZEL’ will be used here as
an example .
The structure of this document is as follows.
PGI /PDO
1 Name
2 Member State or Third Country
3 Description of the agricultural product or foodstuff
3.1. Type of product (e.g. “Class 2.4. Bread, pastry, cakes, confectionery and other baker’s
ware”)
3.2. Description of product to which the name in point 1 applies
3.3. Raw materials (for processed products only)
3.4. Feed (for products of animal origin only)
3.5. Specific steps in production that must take place in the identified geographical area (as in
5.1 below)
3.6. Specific rules concerning slicing, grating, packaging, etc.
3.7. Specific rules concerning labelling
4 Concise definition of the geographical area
5 Link to the geographical area
5.1. Specifity of the geographical area
5.2. Specifity of the product
5.3. Causal link between the geographical area and the quality or characteristics of the product
(for PDO) or a specific quality, the reputation or other characteristic of the product (for PGI)
The geographical area as described here might be a political entity like “Bavaria”, or defined by other borders such as “Ottersburg municipality, bordered to the south-east by the A1”.
The documentation of the geographical indications is far from being machine readable. The key information
for each product is available as PDF only. The structure of these documents seems to vary. Notably the
last paragraph might include historical anecdotes and other information which can be interesting to read
but might have little legal relevance.
Though an ISO standard exists to describe geographic regions like countries or areas within a country and
GS1 data fields and application identifiers referring to those codes, from trial perspective more granularity
is needed to reflect provenance of specialities with regional background. Efforts should be made to make
the information available no only as text but as machine readable structured data.

3.5

Improvements in the Meat Supply Chain

The meat supply chain has many intermediate stages with several complex processes. From slaughtering
to deboning the meat is processed several times. The processing can involve cutting and/or mixing steps
in which the logical link between inputs and outputs might get lost. It is therefore vital to capture information
at critical processing steps.

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Figure 8: Scheme of Meat supply chain
The trial Meat Information on Provenance (MIP) aims at bringing more transparency to meat and meat
products within the entire meat supply chain by using EPCIS. All meat supply chain processes are stored
in one or more repositories that are designed to store EPCIS events.
Following the EPCIS standard, each time a data item is read, an event is generated containing fine-granular
visibility data encompassing four dimensions: what (uniquely identified objects), where (location and read
point), when (time of event) and why (status and business process). The events are stored in a database
(called EPCIS repository). The solution based on EPCIS within the MIP trial is based on the latest EPCIS
1.1 version (http://www.gs1.org/docs/epc/epcis_1_1-standard-20140520.pdf). It allows for capturing events
related to a group of animals or products that have undergone the same process (LGTIN) and the transformation event such as the slaughter of a calf or a processing step.
Compared to conventional traceability procedures the user can retrieve information beyond those he receives from his direct supply chain partners. Even upstream information on live animals like the birth of a
calf or an inspection and information requested by law stay accessible throughout the entire supply chain
can be queried.

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Figure 9: Example of an eartag ID (Source: Angela Schillings-Schmitz)
The screenshot of the MIP Aggregation App shows the linkage between the Eartag ID (requested by law)
and the (S)GTIN. Whereas the Eartag ID is displayed in a dedicated data field it is also the serial part of
the SGTIN. For all downstream processes the SGTIN as state of the art ID will be sufficient and the Eartag
ID can easily be derived. This screenshot also shows that when entering the ID of a calf all events related
to this calf like processing steps or examinations are displayed.

Figure 10: Screen Shot MIP Aggregation App
The slaughter event includes data like the slaughtering number and the identification of the mother, as
requested by the German HI-Tier database (http://www2.hi-tier.de/Entwicklung/Grundlagen/Default.htm).
Thus once authorities accept FIspace as reliable and sufficient data source and implement it the pieces of
information mentioned above can be used to populate authority data bases and need to be captured by the
farmer only once in a system.
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With its established data fields like (S)GTIN and S(GLN) the information can be used as input to B2C
applications such as a consumer app.

3.6

Fish logistic data
To meet the legal requirements on fish traceability in Europe (see

Figure 11: Fish supply chain below for the fish supply chain), the following attributes/key data elements are
of special interest:

• pallet of crates
• pallet of water tank(s)
• crate/box

• fixed/variable weight
• graded/ungraded

• water tank

mixed fish

• live seafood
• fresh seafood
• chilled seafood
• frozen seafood
• further processed fish

• fisher

• aqua culturist

• auctioneer
• importer/exporter
• port agent/broker
• wholesaler

depending upon
number of sales
and processing
steps

• full fish
• fish parts
• fish dish
• fish oil

• commercial fishing vessel
• subsistence fishing
• commercial farm
• subsistence farming

• fishmonger
• food service
• market
• restaurant
• supermarket

• coastal fisher
• inshore fisher
• far-sea fisher

primary processor*)

secondary processor*)

• fishing farm
• wild fish ranch

whole fish catching/harvesting

e.g.
• washing
• heading and cutting

• filleting
• skinning
• inspection
• cooking

• pressing
• drying
• freezing
• packaging

*) A processor does not need to be a separate party. A fisher or aqua culturist could take on this role as well.

Figure 11: Fish supply chain
GTIN, lot, quantity or net weight, expiration or best before date (dependent upon product of concern), fishing
vessel GLN, production unit name, fish species, scientific name, commercial designation, catch area, catch
date(s), supplier GLN, supplier name and address, production method, first freeze date, storage state code,
fishing gear type, fish quality grade, fish size and fish presentation.
In order to support the business processes on each of these data elements GS1 provides automatic identification data capture (AIDC), electronic data interchange (EDI) (both EANCOM and XML), EPCIS as well
as GDSN standards.
Instead of exchanging data manually via Excel files, the use of GS1 standards could significantly improve
business processes in this context.

4 Conclusions
4.1

Open standards / Open Supply Chains

An open supply chain is one in which the complete set of trading partners (including service providers) is
not known in advance and changes continually. This is because:
 trading partnerships change so that new relationships have to be accommodated


an organisation may be unaware of the destination or provenance of its products and other relevant
entities because it is unaware of the (upstream) trading relationships of its trading partners.
GS1 standards that are applied at the interfaces between trading partners are defined outside the context
of any particular trading relationship. This provides interoperability without the need for organisations on
each side of the interface to negotiate individually in advance.
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At the heart of this, the GS1 Identification Keys provide identification that is not dependent on any particular
business relationship or process. Identification of trade items, services, locations, assets and other business objects can be communicated to anybody anywhere in the world without any limitation and without
requiring qualification by one of the parties. This means that identification is portable across the entire
trading partner base including into unforeseen relationships and processes.
The acceptance of standards is expected to be higher, if the pre-conditions to access them are
lower. Free access and no or only nominal fees are therefore recommended.

4.2

Interoperability

Interoperability is the capability of different systems to exchange data based on a shared understanding
of business processes, to read and write in compatible formats and use compatible protocols. If competitors' products are not interoperable (due to causes such as patents, trade secrets or coordination failures)
the result may be a monopoly, market failure, or costly inefficiency.
As for GS1 Standards it is requested that the GS1 System Architecture should promote interoperability.
This can be achieved in four ways:
1.
2.
3.
4.

Through product engineering,
Industry/community partnership,
Access to technology and intellectual property and
Implementation of standards.

Apart from this GS1 System components and any underlying processes that are developed must strive to
be interoperable in their design, development, and implementation to enable the widest adoption and usage by the GS1 community.
The GS1 System Architecture should support the integration of information and physical flows into trading
partners’ systems, so that as far as possible the business process can be supported by automated machineto machine messaging, providing a seamless flow of information through to the end user.
There is evidence of interoperability between applied standards within and across the FIspace trials. Here
are some examples:








Floricode closely works together with GS1 (More information: http://www.floricode.com/en-us/coding.aspx). The VBN Code for flowers and plants traded in auctions is transformed into a GS1 data
structure and encoded in an EAN/UPC Code when sold at Point of Sale.
Though VBN is used to categorize plants and flowers the need to enhance the Global Product
Classification (GPC) developed under the umbrella of GS1 was anticipated in the domain. Thus
from the end of 2014 GPC on bricks for the most common (appr. 800) plants and flower types exist. Whereas VBN maintains to be relevant in case full comprehensiveness is needed it will be
complemented by the GPC especially in case of downstream/retail business (More information:
http://www.gs1.org/1/productssolutions/gdsn/gpc/browser/index.html).
All GS1 Identification standards have an ISO equivalent or are referenced by ISO standards
(http://www.gs1.org/1/productssolutions/gdsn/gpc/browser/index.).
ISO/IEC 15459 is a series of standards specifying identification rules for logistic units, items, returnable assets and groupings. This ISO/IEC standard is used in the Crop Protection Information
Sharing Trial. The standards make provision for Issuing Agencies Codes (IAC) that create
uniqueness between identification schemes from various bodies by prefixing the identifiers with a
code assigned by a registration authority. The IAC 0 to 9 have been assigned to GS1 (More information: http://www.gs1.org/1/productssolutions/gdsn/gpc/browser/index.html).
GS1 uses ISO 3166 Country Codes in the relevant data fields and application identifiers such as
the country of origin or the country of production.

The GS1 System Architecture should support the integration of information and physical flows into
trading partners’ systems, so that as far as possible the business process can be supported by
automated machine-to machine messaging, providing a seamless flow of information through to
the end user.
Besides openness and interoperability further principles are of relevance. A good overview could be found
at http://www.gs1.org/docs/architecture/GS1_Architecture_Principles.pdf.

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Use of available Linked Open Data resources on food and agriculture

Tim Berners-Lee suggested a 5 star deployment scheme for Linked Data (see http://5stardata.info).
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Data is available on the Web, in whatever format (1 star)
Available as machine-readable structured data, (i.e., not a scanned image) (2 stars)
Available in a non-proprietary format, (i.e. CSV, not Microsoft Excel) (3 stars)
Published using open standards from the W3C (RDF and SPARQL) (4 stars)
All of the above and links to other Linked Open Data (5 stars)

Some data on agriculture, food production and logistics can be already classed into one of those levels –
each marked with one up to five stars. However, only a few resources reach the upper levels, especially
four or five stars. A directory of Linked Data can be found at datahub.io. There is also a well-known and
ever-growing graphical representation available (see Figure 12).

Figure 12: The Linking Open Data cloud diagram (Linking Open Data cloud diagram 2014, by Max
Schmachtenberg, Christian Bizer, Anja Jentzsch and Richard Cyganiak.
http://lod-cloud.net/)
The open standards RDF and SPARQL are the core of the semantic web. RDF (Resource description
framework) is a syntax for defining a data model describing triples of subject, predicate, object. SPARQL
is a query language for querying RDF datasets. A SPARQL endpoint accepts queries and returns results
via HTTP.
A central resource for agriculture within the semantic web is CIARDRING, a directory of information services and datasets in agriculture (http://ring.ciard.net/sparql1). The FAO’s multilingual thesaurus Agrovoc
is also available a SPARQL endpoint (202.45.139.84:10035/catalogs/fao/repositories/agrovoc). Denmark
published its agricultural government data as semantic web data (http://extbi.lab.aau.dk:8080/sparql/). A
domain-specific project is the ontology on beef production (http://onto.beef.org.pl/sparql.html). Another useful resource for the agrifood domain is the European Environment Agency: http://semantic.eea.europa.eu/sparql,
The approach followed by the given examples facilitates the sharing of data and the generation of
knowledge based on the available information. The publication of data as Linked Open Data and the
implementation of SPARQL endpoints are therefore recommended.

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Title                           : Recommendations for new or updated standards
Author                          : Esther Mietzsch
Subject                         : Deliverable D500.4.2
Keywords                        : FIspace, FI-PPP, Future Internet, cSpace
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