RFID application in the food industry: A case study of Korean food safety information systems project

The main goal of this study is to investigate the opportunities, challenges, and prospects of applying Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology to the food supply management context where food safety issue is highly valued. Several key factors and implications have been identified based on longitudinal data gathered from a real life RFID project that was initiated and implemented by the Korean Food Industry Association (KFIA), Ministry of Information and Communication (MIC), National Information Society Agency (NISA) and other major industrial companies. The authors utilize the case study approach that serves well with this research by focusing on the organizational role of RFID. Being in line with the objective of evaluating RFID's potentials as technology enabler, this paper renders the following important findings: item level tagging requires detailed and customized guidelines; standardized system development procedures among stakeholders is critical to the success of RFID implementation; not only does RFID facilitate management operations, when properly communicated, it can also effectively formulate or impact the customer's purchase intention.