Best Industry Practices for Supply Chain Security and Product Traceability

With each passing second, the digital world is growing into something bigger, bigger than the whole wide world. Though this digital era is bringing forth several advantages, there are dangers lurking in every neighborhood as well. One such danger is product counterfeiting.

No matter how the companies try to protect their supply chains from counterfeiters, the illegal dealers always find a way to enter and steal information. What’s worse is that the technology that was made to protect our complex supply chains, is also providing ideas to such dealers on how to break and enter. The only way to protect supply chains is by enhancing our existing supply chain security tenfold. How? By using advanced technology, introducing new tactics, and designing anti-counterfeit packaging that will defeat counterfeiters and protect our supply chain at all cost.

What Is Supply Chain Security?

Supply chain security is a broad subject that covers everything involved in the process. From dealing with transactions, risks from immediate shareholder and third-party dealers, to thefts and physical threats, supply chain security covers all of the above instances.

In simple words, supply chain security should be a multi-layered with broad coverage that deals with every complexity in the system.

But why is supply chain security so important? We used to deal with vulnerable supply chains with minimal security years ago. Yes, we did, and some major companies did face severe losses.

Besides, end consumers are becoming more aware of products and want to know everything about them. This includes the entire supply chain, product authentication, and checking whether the products they are consuming at home are original or counterfeit. Nobody wants to buy a product or brand that is not reliable. Hence, it’s essential to secure supply chains properly so that there’s no infiltration and end consumers get quality results.

Major Supply Chain Security Concerns

As supply chains are becoming more and more complex with advancing time and technology, so are the problems related to their security. Some of the major security concerns that supply chain leaders are facing in FMCG sectors are as follows.

Theft & Sabotage

One of the major issues that every company, FMCG or not, faces is theft and sabotage, both internal and external. It’s pretty common for products to go through a number of touchpoints before reaching the final destination. Between such touchpoints, there are chances of packages getting stolen and sold illegally for gaining profit.

The above was the case of external theft, which is not always in the hand of companies. But, when it comes to internal theft, better known as insider trading, the question arises about the organization’s security team.

When companies started interrogating about the issue, what they found was indeed shocking. As per the analyses, they discovered that majority of such thefts was done by employees. Why? Because they had grudges and complaints against the companies, or in some cases, got a better deal from rival organizations. What happened next was quite predictable. Employees did insider trading and leaked all important information for rivals to feed on.

Infiltration & Piracy

There are several cases of infiltration and pirated products that are sold in the name of reputed brands. In this case, one of the best examples is India’s pharmaceutical sector. As per surveys, around 20% of medicines manufactured in India are counterfeit.

But, how do these counterfeit products arrive in the market? It happens when illegal activities are conducted during any ongoing supply chain.

Let’s say a company is manufacturing a surplus amount of Potato chips and has to sell them within a week to reach the target. Since the supply chain would be actively busy and overloaded with data from several sides, injecting the chain with spurious products becomes easier. The counterfeit chips makers can simply mix up original and fake chips at the end step and sell them ahead for profit.

The above is just a simple example of pirated products. But, there have been so many cases in several fields about infiltration and piracy that securing the entire supply chain is the only option.

Solutions for Supply Chain Concerns

Every problem has a solution: this is highly applicable while solving supply chain security concerns. Below are some of the best practices industries have adopted for dealing with such risks.

Product Traceability

Traceabilityis one of the most popular solutions worldwide. What if you get to track every package at every step of the supply chain? Or what if you get to trace packages that went missing from warehouses and raise necessary actions?

With proper track and trace solutions, you can solve the problem of external theft and take necessary actions. The best way to implement a track and trace solutionis by adding product QR codeson every package, thus, allowing you to keep records of everything in the supply chain.

Besides, traceabilityis also helpful in dealing with insider trading. With a strong track and trace system, you will have complete control over the organization’s data usage. You will be in charge of providing access to employees for consuming data, keeping records about it, and viewing if any misconduct is occurring.

Product Authentication

With rising cases of duplicate products, implementing anti-counterfeit solutionshas become essential for organizations. There are several ways through which organizations can use such solutions to maintain both product and brand authentication. Besides, these anti-counterfeitingsolutions also help spread awareness amongst consumers.

One of the best methods is to install anti-counterfeit QR codes,which, upon scanning, will open up a PDF or the official website stating that the product is genuine.              

Another method to deal with counterfeit dealers is by adapting smart packaging solutions. Here, you can enable ML-based algorithms on the products that let you know the exact location of each package and the frequency between each scan. It will help you know if any of the boxes are stolen or being sold in different areas.

As the complexity of each supply chain increases every day, so does the need to have a strong defense system that can protect everything going on inside the process? Though there are several supply chain threats, organizations need to figure out the solutions that work best for them. Whether proper anti-counterfeit solutions will give them apt results or product traceability will protect them from piracy, the organizations need to understand which solutions will provide aid to their concerns. If you want to know more about smart packaging solutions, track and trace software, or anti-counterfeit solutions,contact Sepio solutions at [email protected]