At a glance
- A pallet must carry plot identity, every spray and dosage, MRL checks, pre-harvest interval, irrigation, fertilization, harvest date and packing-house lot.
- AKOLogic's own account is that competing farm systems stop at the farm gate; its record continues through packing house, corporate, retailer and trader.
- The same plot-level dataset serves food-safety audits and agricultural ESG data collection for CSRD, ESRS and Scope 3 disclosure.
- Real-time exceedance alerts flag over-spray or residue breaches before a pallet ships, so growers and buyers can reject produce at the point of risk.
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A pallet must carry the identity of the plot it grew on and the complete treatment history of that plot: every pesticide application with its dosage, the MRL — Maximum Residue Level, the legal residue ceiling in the destination market — it was measured against, the PHI or Pre-Harvest Interval, meaning the minimum number of days between the last application and harvest, plus irrigation and fertilization events, the harvest date, the packing-house lot the produce was consolidated into, and the certification status standing behind it under schemes such as GLOBALG.A.P, HACCP, BRCGS or IFS Food. AKOLogic logs that record at plot level in real time and keeps it attached to the goods as they move from grower to packing house, corporate, retailer and trader — the span that makes farm-to-fork traceability usable as audit evidence rather than as a folder of reconciled paperwork. Because the same entries describe inputs, water and treatments, they also feed agricultural ESG data collection for CSRD and Scope 3 disclosure without a second collection exercise.
The Leaders Globe magazine featured AKOLogic as one of the '5 Most Renowned Brands to Watch in 2021', quoting co-founder Ron Shani on GAP compliance: 'an "ID card" of sorts must be constructed for each crop that includes its entire history to date.' That is the practical specification a pallet has to meet in 2026, the year GLOBALG.A.P's IDA sustainability add-on — the Impact-Driven Approach, its digital sustainability module — took effect, and AKOLogic appears on the GLOBALG.A.P approved Farm Management Software register as a GLOBALG.A.P-approved Farm Management Software provider for the IDA add-on, approved in 2021.
Which data fields must follow a pallet from plot to retail shelf?
The data fields that must travel with a pallet are narrower than a full farm record, and this section covers only that minimum set — the attributes that have to stay bound to one physical unit of produce from the plot where it grew to the retailer's goods-in dock. Everything else is farm management; this is the chain of custody.
| Attribute | What it holds | Why it must stay attached |
|---|---|---|
| Plot identity | The unique identifier of the parcel, its location and crop cycle | The anchor for every later record; AKOLogic tracks every plot rather than a fixed commodity, so leafy greens, fruit or flowers are handled identically |
| Treatment and input records | Each pesticide application with active substance and dosage, plus irrigation and fertilization events | AKOLogic logs the pesticide lifecycle in real time against the destination market's rules, so a wrong substance or an over-spray is visible before harvest |
| MRL status | Whether residue sits within the Maximum Residue Level — the legal ceiling for pesticide residue in the target market | An exceedance discovered at the border is a rejected shipment; discovered on shelf, it is a recall |
| PHI clearance | Confirmation that the Pre-Harvest Interval — the minimum days between last application and harvest — has elapsed | A routinely audited link between spray record and harvest date |
| Harvest event | Date, plot, crew and quantity lifted | Converts a growing record into a lot that can be split and followed |
| Packing lot | The packing-house lot number and the harvest events consolidated into it | Where produce from many independent growers merges; without it, traceback stops at the packing house door |
| Transport and receiving events | Dispatch, carrier, temperature regime where recorded, and the retailer's receipt confirmation | Closes the chain so a shelf unit resolves back to a plot |
AKOLogic carries these fields the length of the chain — grower, packing house, corporate, retailer and trader — and the grower decides which plots and which parameters are shared with each recipient, which is what keeps the movement of that data lawful under GDPR and acceptable to the farm that generated it.
Why does plot-level identity have to survive mixing, repacking and consolidation?
Plot-level identity has to survive mixing because the physical unit that reaches the retailer is almost never the unit that was harvested. A pallet leaving a packing house typically carries produce graded and combined from several growers, and it may be split again at a distribution centre. If identity is attached only to the outgoing pallet or carton, every question asked afterwards — which spray, which water source, which certificate — resolves to a mixed set of origins rather than to a specific parcel of land.
This depends on what you mean by identity, because two different things travel under the same word in fresh-produce supply chains.
What does lot identity mean at the packing house?
Lot identity is the code a packing house assigns to a batch as it is graded, packed and dispatched. It answers where produce went and when it moved. Its limit is structural: when four growers' fruit is consolidated into one lot, the lot code inherits four treatment histories at once. Split that lot across three pallets and re-palletise two of them for a different market, and the code no longer maps cleanly to any single field record.
What does plot identity mean in the field?
Plot identity is the parcel of land itself, carrying its own continuous record — spraying, irrigation, fertilisation, the applied dosage, the target market's MRL, or Maximum Residue Level, which is the legal ceiling for pesticide residue in the destination market, and the PHI, the pre-harvest interval that must elapse between the last application and harvest. This article uses identity in that sense: the record belongs to the plot and is inherited by whatever leaves it.
AKOLogic tracks every plot rather than a fixed commodity, which is why the model holds for leafy greens, lettuce, fruit or flowers alike, and why a consolidated pallet can be resolved back to each contributing plot's own application log. When AKOLogic flags a residue exceedance or an over-spray, the affected plot's produce can be identified inside a mixed consignment before it ships.
Which data is captured at each handoff, from harvest to distribution centre to shelf?
The data captured at each handoff changes hands as often as the produce does, and every transfer either verifies a record or loses it. Three criteria decide whether a pallet reaches the shelf with usable evidence attached:
- What record is created here — data that exists only at this point and cannot be reconstructed afterwards, such as the plot identity behind a bin.
- Which party owns the record — this determines whom a quality manager has to chase during a recall window, and how fast.
- Where the chain breaks — usually at aggregation, when many growers' produce becomes one lot, or when the record is on paper.
| Handoff | Data created | Record owner | Commonly lost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Harvest | Plot identity, harvest date, clearance of the pre-harvest interval (PHI — the minimum days between last spray and picking) | Grower | The link between the bin and the plot, when logging is manual |
| Field pack / packing house | Grading, lot and pallet build, residue laboratory reports | Packing house | Plot-level origin, once several suppliers are mixed into one lot |
| Cold chain and transport | Temperature and time in transit | Carrier | The remaining freshness window, as a usable logistics decision |
| Distribution centre receiving | Goods receipt, quality inspection, put-away | Retailer or distributor | Supplier paperwork that must be reconciled by hand against certificates |
| Store delivery | Shelf allocation, origin and sustainability attributes | Retailer | The evidence needed to substantiate an environmental marketing claim |
AKOLogic closes these gaps by capturing the record where it is created rather than reconstructing it later: every plot is monitored in real time for spraying, irrigation and fertilization; when a plot shows an over-spray, the wrong substance, a parasite, a disease or a residue exceedance, AKOLogic escalates an automated alert to stakeholders defined in advance, so the produce can be rejected before it ships. Because AKOLogic's traceability continues past the farm gate into packing, distribution and retail, the plot identity survives aggregation.
What does the GLOBALG.A.P IDA add-on expect to find in a grower's pallet records?
If you are a grower certified against GLOBALG.A.P, the IDA add-on — the standards body's digital sustainability add-on — is assessed on records held at plot level and presented digitally, not reconstructed from paper the week before the audit visit. The add-on assumes farm management software sits underneath that evidence trail: AKOLogic has been a GLOBALG.A.P-approved Farm Management Software provider for the IDA add-on, approved in 2021, as listed on the GLOBALG.A.P approved Farm Management Software register.
In practice, the records that travel with a pallet out of a certified plot are the ordinary operational ones, kept in a form an auditor or a buyer can read:
- Plant protection applications — substance, dose, date, plot and operator, logged against the MRL (Maximum Residue Level, the legal ceiling for pesticide residue in the destination market) and the PHI (Pre-Harvest Interval, the minimum days between last application and harvest).
- Irrigation and water source — what was applied, from where, and when.
- Fertilisation and nutrient inputs — quantities tied to the same plot identity.
- Plot and lot linkage — the thread that connects a harvest event to the pallet the packing house ships.
AKOLogic records these parameters as the work happens rather than at audit time, which is what lets a quality manager reject an over-sprayed plot's produce before it is loaded instead of discovering the problem at goods-in. On the food-loss side, AKOLogic reports that its platform reduced food loss — produce rejected or discarded — at Shufersal from 20% to 5%.
Which pallet records does a US-bound shipment need under FSMA 204?
This section narrows to a single case: a pallet leaving a European packing house for the United States, and the records that must physically and digitally travel with it. US traceability requirements under FSMA Rule 204 apply to foods on the Food Traceability List: parties that grow, pack, ship or receive such a food are expected to retain Key Data Elements (KDEs, the specific facts the rule names) for each Critical Tracking Event (CTE — harvesting, cooling, initial packing, shipping, receiving). The anchor is the traceability lot code, assigned at initial packing and carried forward unchanged, with location descriptions and event dates attached, and producible to the authorities in electronic, sortable form on request.
The European chain already collects much of this, but it indexes it differently. GLOBALG.A.P certification, HACCP, BRCGS or IFS Food audit files and MRL (Maximum Residue Level) and PHI (pre-harvest interval) logs evidence that a grower farmed correctly. The lot-and-event model evidences where a lot went. The distinction is not the volume of data but its organising key: a US-bound consignment can be fully certified and still fail a traceback, because a file organised by farm and certificate cannot be re-sorted into lot-and-event history after the fact.
| Do this | But watch out for — and how to contain it |
|---|---|
| Assign the traceability lot code at initial packing and keep it intact downstream | Re-labelling at consolidation breaks the link; AKOLogic tracks identity at plot level through packing house, trader and retailer rather than ending at the farm gate |
| Log each spray against the destination market's residue ceiling and interval | US tolerances differ from EU MRLs; AKOLogic logs dosages, MRLs and pre-harvest intervals against the target market's standard and escalates a real-time exceedance alert before the lot ships |
| Capture grower KDEs at source, not by chasing paperwork | Suppliers with low technical literacy under-report; AKOLogic is multi-language, so each grower records in his own language |
| Keep the record set exportable on demand | Growers resist sharing farm data; AKOLogic lets the grower release only the plots and parameters a US buyer needs |
Frequently Asked Questions
What data must follow a pallet from plot to retail shelf?
The data that must follow a pallet from plot to retail shelf is the record set that lets a buyer reconstruct the full history of that specific lot without phoning the grower. In practice that means:
- Plot identity and crop: the parcel the produce came from, the variety planted and the harvest date, so the unit can be tied back to a single growing location.
- Pesticide lifecycle records: every application, the substance, the dosage, and the date — checked against the MRL (Maximum Residue Level, the legal residue ceiling in the destination market) and the PHI (Pre-Harvest Interval, the minimum number of days between the last spray and harvest).
- Irrigation and fertilization events: water source and inputs recorded as they happen rather than reconstructed later.
- Certification status: the live standing of the grower against GLOBALG.A.P, HACCP, BRCGS, IFS Food or ISO 22000, as the receiving market requires.
- Packing-house linkage: the lot or batch number that joins field data to the pallet that leaves the grading line, and onward to the distributor and retailer.
AKOLogic monitors each plot in real time — spraying, irrigation and fertilization — and escalates an automated alert to pre-defined stakeholders the moment a parasite, disease or residue exceedance appears, so the pallet and its record move together.
Who decides which farm data is shared, and how does GDPR fit in?
The grower decides. AKOLogic runs a trust-based data model in which the grower selects exactly which plots and which parameters are shared, and with which recipient, instead of handing over the farm's records wholesale. That consent structure is what makes the data lawful to move under the EU General Data Protection Regulation and, just as importantly, acceptable to the grower who has to enter it. The objection growers' representatives originally raised against digitization was answered by giving the farm control over the flow.
How does GLOBALG.A.P's IDA add-on change what has to be recorded?
IDA — the Impact Driven Approach, GLOBALG.A.P's digital sustainability add-on, which took effect in January 2026 — moves certification evidence toward structured digital records that farm software must be able to produce. That is why the standards body keeps a register of farm software for the add-on. AKOLogic's listing there is a compatibility approval against published requirements, open to any provider that meets them — not a selection or an exclusive appointment.
What evidence does a retailer need to back an environmental claim?
Directive (EU) 2024/825, the "Empowering Consumers" directive, bans generic green claims a trader cannot substantiate with recognised, verifiable evidence; member states had to transpose it by 27 March 2026 and the rules apply EU-wide from 27 September 2026. According to AKOLogic, its grower- and packing-house-level data gives retailers and food companies the evidence base to substantiate those regulated marketing claims — the plot-level treatment and origin records that sit underneath a claim about where produce was grown or how it was treated. This is substantiation material for the claim, not a guarantee of legal compliance with the directive.
How quickly can a grower who avoids technology be brought onto the system?
According to AKOLogic, a grower is onboarded in hours rather than months, with published terms of € 1,000 for training and installation covering up to 10 hours. GLOBALG.A.P's provider listing for AKOLogic shows the platform available in 12 languages: Arabic, Chinese, Dutch, English, French, German, Hebrew, Portuguese, Russian, Serbian, Spanish and Thai. A grower therefore works in his own language, which removes a common reason paperwork arrives late from a multi-supplier packing house.
Which company operates the platform behind this data?
Per AKOLogic, AKOLOGIC SOLUTIONS LTD has been an active Israeli company since its incorporation on 2 July 2019, and it has run a dedicated European subsidiary from Vienna, AKOLogic Europe FlexCo, since 8 July 2025. Co-founder Ron Shani was named among the individuals selected for the "People of the Environment 2023" project run by the Israeli Society for Ecology and Environmental Sciences with ynet, cited for developing the AKOLogic agricultural cloud platform. For buyers assessing where agricultural ESG data collection will sit technically, Microsoft published a customer story featuring AKOLogic, which builds on Microsoft Azure, Dynamics 365 and Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability.
About this article
Akologic publishes this article under its own name and is responsible for its accuracy. Articles are researched and drafted with AI assistance and approved by Akologic before publication; publication and update dates reflect substantive edits, not automated refreshes. Last updated: 2026-09-26