AGSG formed

Companies in Australia’s Agribusiness Sector have joined forces to improve supply chain processes and services, through the adoption of GS1 global standards.

Key suppliers and retailers have formed an industry working group - the Agribusiness GS1 Standards Group (AGSG).

The group’s key objective is to work with all interested industry trading partners to promote and set guidelines for the implementation of the GS1 standards including product identification, automatic data capture, electronic messaging, data synchronisation and product classifications to enable effective and efficient business processes.

Confirmed participants in AGSG are Landmark, Elders, Ruralco, First4Farming (F4F), Syngenta Crop Protection, Nufarm, Incitec Pivot Fertilisers, Farmoz, Ridley AgriProducts, Pacific Seeds and Pfizer. The group is working with GS1 Australia, a not-for-profit supply chain standards and services organisation.

The AGSG is calling on other businesses in the agribusiness sector to come forward and participate in the initiative.

The AGSG steering committee Chair, Andrew Pollard of Landmark, said: “Barcoding is our number one focus. This will enable greater data accuracy, enable technologies such as POS and warehouse management systems, and will become the single product identifier for all parties in the supply chain. We intend to leverage GS1 Australia’s expertise in this area as the level of knowledge of retail barcoding within the industry is poor. This will set the stage for a new level of standards and business improvement for rural sector B2B.”

The AGSG has set up three work groups - numbering and barcoding; e-messaging and master data synchronisation; batch management and traceability - and invites interested industry participants to become actively involved.

The group believe these are three areas that can deliver tangible results to all participants in a short timeframe.

The AGSG steering committee Vice-Chair, Keith Quiney of Syngenta Crop Protection, said: “The agribusiness sector needs to leverage the work already done by the hardware sector to jump-start the implementation process and shorten implementation time as much as possible.”

The AGSG will meet regularly, alternating between Sydney and Melbourne for meetings, and will offer both webinar and teleconference facilities to participants.