SAITAMA (Kyodo) A computer system that lets shoppers check background information on vegetables they want to buy was successfully tested Thursday at 25 supermarkets and several agricultural cooperatives, according to an industry group.
The system allows people to retrieve data embedded in labels on the food to learn where a given vegetable was grown, who cultivated it, how many chemicals were used and the distribution route that was used to bring it to market.
The system, which uses in-store terminals and cell phones, was developed by a federation of some 1,800 smaller supermarkets with the support of the Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Ministry. Agricultural co-ops in Gunma and Chiba prefectures and 25 supermarkets in the greater Tokyo area participated in Thursday's experiment.
At a supermarket in Saitama Prefecture, for example, one participant pretending to be a farmer used a cell phone to input agricultural data that was then uploaded to the computer database. The information was then retrieved from a label bearing a QR code by a shopper using a terminal in the supermarket.
The data can be read by certain cell phones, and consumers can also talk into the system to give their opinions of the database.
"The new system seems like a great idea because I'm most concerned about the agrochemical residue on vegetables," said Mikako Tomita, a 62-year-old housewife who bought cabbage after checking its background through the trial.
