Introduction

The Internet of Things describes the network objects within the technologies to connect with the data; IOT helps to initiate the data with the system and the Internet is helpful for the industries (Stoyanova et al., 2020). The agriculture industry has been impacted by better crops and improved worker safety for the farmer which conducts a lack of performance and results. IoT and blockchain technology benefit the process through the accurate monitoring and prediction system through the significance and agility of the processes. The report will discuss the agriculture industry within the impact of Blockchain and it will discuss the technology and problem within the blockchain and IoT solutions for agri-food organizations. The report will determine the approaches throughout the adaptation and relevance of IoT and Blockchain in the agriculture industry. It will also examine the challenges in the IoT supply chain network accordingly, which impacted the systems directly throughout the industry. It conducts the industrial loss of the particular industry and its set-up.

Main Body

Blockchain impacts the agricultural industry

The Blockchain helps to track the information within the plants, including the quality and quantity throughout the Blockchain. This technology records the plant's journey, which could be helpful for its growth and reduce the issues throughout the agricultural industry. The high and low demand for agriculture and specific cropping due to the seasonal foods and plantations and this data also helps to understand the condition of the plants and seeds within the growth, which is very important for the agricultural industry blockchain. There are different types of impact throughout this technology, which mismanages the agricultural objectives and goals. Agriculture activity includes farming, herding and many more, which is essential for the plants and plantation process. The Blockchain helps to enable Traceability to improve the food quality and its procedure by understanding the nature of the foods and their material throughout the technological usage (Yadav & Singh, 2019).

Figure 1: Blockchain technology

Source: (Bbvaopenmind, 2020)

The blockchain impact on the agriculture industry is Scalability which is not efficient and complex for the supply chain management in the low and high demands with the customers. It has also been analysed that the Blockchain conducts the ability to understand the development within the innovation like farming and quality check, which is very important for the agriculture industry supply. Blockchain is the technology to conduct the lack of awareness due to technical issues; it also initiates the lack of understanding throughout the process. It is beneficial for the agriculture activities like Farming, Food quality and Accessibility throughout the technology, which is very beneficial for the farmer throughout the process. It has also been analysed that the Blockchain impacts the agriculture industry with a time-consuming process without the upgraded technology, which can be Insecure sometimes (Yadav & Singh, 2019). Time is significant for plantation and farming because the seasonal food crops and many more activities are dependent; the Blockchain leads to the complex factors over the time consumption, which connects with the computing systems. The distribution system has different factors impacting the chain's technological usage due to the dependency on seasonal agriculture.

The Blockchain impacted the agriculture industry with hesitation due to excessive energy usage within the distributed computing system, enabling security issues throughout the blockchain technology. It has also been analysed that it impacted security because blockchain technology does not offer network security throughout the entries, which are not forever lasting due to the technological issues. The agriculture industry has been analysed with the inefficient operating the technology throughout the operations. It has been demonstrated that the Blockchain is a massive chain of complexity and inefficient throughout agricultural operations and industrial usage due to the supply chain being dependent on seasonal cropping (Atlam et al., 2020). The impact of the Blockchain with the referred reason can be impactful for the future usage of the agricultural operation, which can be massive for the operational work after the workload of the appropriate technology is uncontrollable. Blockchain technology can be hacked easily due to security, which conducts the issues in a large number of data within the technology. The data is critical to be secured in terms of the technology, and the global chain can be insecure of the numerous data. It has been also analysed that the impacts of the blockchain are beneficial and hazardous for the industry the security reason. It conducts the operations issues within the challenges related to supply chain, network and agricultural activities. The blockchain conducts a higher range of technological activities which helps to ease the activities with the help of a distribution system and monitoring.

Blockchain and IoT Problems and Solutions

Agri-food includes agriculture, fisheries and aquaculture and food beverages throughout the processing, and it has been analysed that the Blockchain and IoT are the technological benefits for the agriculture industry, which conducts the solution for agricultural activities like farming, cropping and field analysis which is very helpful for the farmers and other helpers in the agriculture industry. The farmers have different types of problems like cropping issues, field analysis, food quality, Satisfaction of the customers and high quality accordingly (Ferrag et al., 2020). These issues are expected of the farmers throughout the agri-food; the food taste is expected to be more satisfying. These issues are the lack of technology used throughout the process. The problems of the farmers are the physical presence on the field, analysing the field throughout the monitoring the crops, the condition of the farming and many more.

The Blockchain and IoT are significant technological advancements that conduct the farmers' high-quality monitoring system. The technological usage of the farmers will help the industry to be more effective in the work operations like temperature, light humidity and many more (Xiong et al., 2020). The issues can be solved within justified reason with the help of analysing the situation in the terms of industry. The problems within the agriculture industry farmers are to understand the irrigation system within the field condition, which conducts the issues with the weather and many more.

Blockchain solutions

It has been analysed that the Blockchain could help the agricultural activities within the technological advancement throughout the monitoring systems by the Internet of things (IoT). Blockchain tools can solve agri-food issues by increasing the trust of consumers and suppliers. It will also help to understand which helps to share the information, reducing the transactional cost. Blockchain will also increase the supply and demand in the supply chain, which reduces the business cost, and increase transparency between the customers, which will help improve the Blockchain systems with the help of advanced technology (Kamilaris et al., 2019). It also holds the traceability problem within the crops and farmers, which can be monitored accordingly.

Internet of things (IoT) solutions

Internet of things (IoT) is one of the numerous consequential for improvement in addition to the design, which can be helped throughout the technology.

Figure 2: Internet of things

Source: (Tibco, 2020)

The Internet of thing will be built the system with the help of sensors that can assist the farmers to know the level of heat, humidity, soil moisture, and the health of the crop and it will lead to the most straightforward task for the farmers which create the improved situation for these solutions (Elijah et al., 2018). These systems and monitoring will help the farmers to solve the problems of the farmers during farming which can be a lack of agricultural activities. This technology is live and supportive in the case of the weather throughout the farming situation. Internet of things can build the system for mapping the field and surveying throughout the distance, easing the responsibilities of the cropping, plantations and farming during the year.

Blockchain leverage in farm-to-market design

The farm-to-market design is the agriculture path for the farmer, which has been designed with the help of customers and suppliers who works with the farmers. The contracts and cropping factors conduct the relationship between the suppliers and customers which ensures the market from the farm is leveraged. Blockchain technology helps to understand the customers with the help of technological advancement control. The farm-to-market process design started with the movement of the farm products to the market with the contract with the business firms and traders to establish the business. The business can be set with the help of the physical condition of the farming and its cropping behaviour (Chang et al., 2018). The farming business can be trusted throughout the condition of the farming within the contract. The factor that affects farming is transportation which is very important for the farm due to the supply chain being an implied stake in the crops and plantation.

The Blockchain could help the farmers with the help of technology which could improve food quality and quality control within the organisational approaches. The agricultural industry is concerned with the quality and control throughout the farming condition; the technology system will improve by implementing the farm-to-market design within the application and agricultural activities. The traceability can be improved with the help of blockchain technology throughout the efficient systems. The farmers could understand the system within the monitoring handling; the farmers could initiate the supply chain and enhance the relationship with the help of the blockchain approach (Schramm, 2019). It also increases the trust between the partners, which is very important while farming; the suppliers and customers could easily trust the monitoring system, which can be leveraged with the design of the farm to market throughout the supply chain. Blockchain technology is beneficial for agricultural transaction cost reduction with the help of monitoring and distributing systems.

The supply chain and demands are essential for the agricultural industry, which can be easily solved with blockchain technology to improve the traceability and monitoring of the process. It also leads to combining process with progressive learning, and analytical tools are the part of the Blockchain which can be implemented to leverage the farm-to-market design (Rabah, 2018). The design includes the supplying process, which could be analysed with the monitoring and understood throughout the approach within the field condition and supply management of farming solutions.

Agri-food organisations approach 

The agri-food organisational approaches have been adopted by companies like the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) and Crop Protection Association (CPA) are the manufacturer of the United Kingdom which adapts the Internet of things and blockchain technology (Netregs, 2022). The complex supply chain of agricultural supply chain includes three steps, farmers, to intermediate silos, from the silos to the transformation plants, and from the transformational plants to clients. Each step needs a different type of decision, defined as multiple decisions. Traceability in the supply chain can understand the element within the tracking and tracing throughout the supply and demands. The monitoring systems are used for supply chain management, which is very important for agricultural approaches.

Figure 3: Supply chain of agriculture

Source: (Mckinsey, 2022)

As per the figure, the multiple decision leads to the uncertain activities solution throughout the network, which is very important for security reasons. This supply chain management includes the organisational analysis due to the uncertainties in the transportation options and many storage points. However, the outcome may change within the unpredictable farming and cropping supply chain. These operational factors could impact the farmer's capabilities due to the global imbalance in the supply chain and demands within agri-food organisations. The adaption of blockchain technology and the Internet of things helped these issues within the farming and supply chain management throughout the concept of adaption and application within the network (Menon & Jain, 2021).

The agriculture industry has adapted the supply chain within the blockchain technology and the Internet of things, which is very important to manage the cropping, analyse the field and fulfil the supply demands throughout the monitoring system. The agri-food technology is being advanced throughout the Blockchain, which conducts the suppliers' relationships with the help of supply chain monitoring. The farming condition has been created within the modern approaches. The supply chain concepts are the predictive result for the potential results of blockchain technology and the Internet of things. The supply chain concept has been adapted within the agricultural techniques by tracing something in the products and farming. The tracing requirements have been adapted with the help of blockchain technology which analyses the product life cycle throughout the agri-food.

The IoT applications are creating things better within the process, like innovating the agri-food activities and agricultural trace throughout the IoT. Blockchain technology and the Internet of things are applied within the United Kingdom companies to measure the success in the individual activities which conduct the transformation in the agriculture industry. It has also been analysed that agriculture can be installed in smart grids, upgrading the supply chain management throughout the challenges. The real-time technological ideas have been used within the agricultural environment, which helps in the inventory of the supply chain. The demands of the farming and agricultural activities have been adopted within the companies to build efficient processes in agri-food performance (Awan et al., 2021).

Cyber security challenges in the IoT supply chain

Cyber security concerns have been faced by the supply chain network in the agri-food organisation and industry through IoT, which has been identified within the systems, and they are:

• The installation of the IoT devices is very complex and mainly within the security systems; however, the installation could be dangerous due to the IoT having weak installation, which allows the hacker to break down the device. The surrounding network is hazardous within the weak installation issues in the supply chain.
• Cyber security concerns are the breakdown of the network's supply chain, which presents issues within the system; the monitoring system can be hacked with the help of malware systems.
• Ransomware attacks through IoT devices are a concern throughout the devices that conduct the IoT supply chain network issues.
• The loss of network and monitoring within the security concern is the main challenge within the Internet of things. The IoT is a threatful infrastructure that could harm the company while hacked throughout the systems (Sobb et al., 2020).
• The network gaps have been included within the network security system; it has been analysed that the networking throughout the challenges.
• Many IoT supply chain management is technical complex within the connectivity and power dependence which could cause security concerns throughout the complexity.
• The data handling and data gathering within the data overloading issues are the security issues within the supply chain which could hack the system between monitoring.
• The Supply chain network also increases privacy concerns, unemployment and high dependency on monitoring, which could impact the supply chain in agri-food organisations.

Conclusion

Blockchain technology and the IoT are concepts that conduct advanced technology useful for organisational activities. The report has discussed blockchain technology and the Internet of things in the agricultural industry. It discussed the modern technological changes and the impact of the IoT on solving agri-food performance. The impact of Blockchain in the agricultural industry has increased the advantage and disadvantages. The report has discussed the solution within the adaptation and application of approaches throughout the agri-food organisations with the help of supply chain concepts. The report has concluded with the security challenges in the supply chain networks throughout cyber security. 

 

References

Atlam, H. F., Azad, M. A., Alzahrani, A. G., & Wills, G. (2020). A Review of Blockchain in Internet of Things and AI. Big Data and Cognitive Computing, 4(4), 28.

Awan, S., Ahmed, S., Ullah, F., Nawaz, A., Khan, A., Uddin, M. I., & Alyami, H. (2021). IoT with Blockchain: A futuristic approach in agriculture and food supply chain. Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing, 2021.

Chang, J., Katehakis, M. N., Melamed, B., & Shi, J. J. (2018). Blockchain design for supply chain management. Available at SSRN 3295440.

Elijah, O., Rahman, T. A., Orikumhi, I., Leow, C. Y., & Hindia, M. N. (2018). An overview of the Internet of Things (IoT) and data analytics in agriculture: Benefits and challenges. IEEE Internet of things Journal, 5(5), 3758-3773.

Ferrag, M. A., Shu, L., Yang, X., Derhab, A., & Maglaras, L. (2020). Security and privacy for green IoT-based agriculture: Review, blockchain solutions, and challenges. IEEE Access, 8, 32031-32053.

Kamilaris, A., Fonts, A., & Prenafeta-Bold?, F. X. (2019). The rise of blockchain technology in agriculture and food supply chains. Trends in Food Science & Technology, 91, 640-652.

Mckinsey, (2022). Supply chain agriculture Retrieved from <https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/agriculture/our-insights/agriculture-supply-chain-optimization-and-value-creation> [Accessed on 8 August 2022]

Menon, S., & Jain, K. (2021). Blockchain Technology for Transparency in Agri-Food Supply Chain: Use Cases, Limitations, and Future Directions. IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management.