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Watson
Project overview

Resilience Guard GmbH is delighted to be part of the WATSON Consortium. WATSON is a Horizon Europe project aspiring to tackle the problem of food fraud in a holistic way, by providing a methodological framework for the detection and prevention of fraudulent activities in the food chain. Our main task is to develop a powerful engine that will facilitate the quantification of risk throughout the entire WATSON ecosystem.

Funding

The WATSON project has received funding from the HORIZON 2.6 – Food, Bioeconomy Natural Resources, Agriculture and Environment program under Grant Agreement No 101084265.

Project description

The 3-year WATSON project (start date 1 March 2023) under the title "A holistic frameWork with Anticounterfeit and inTelligence-based technologieS that will assist food chain stakehOlders in rapidly identifying and preveNting the spread of fraudulent practices." aims to provide a methodological framework combined with a set of tools and systems that can detect and prevent fraudulent activities throughout the whole food chain, thus accelerating the deployment of transparency solutions in the EU food systems.

WATSON implements an intelligence-based risk calculation approach to address the phenomenon of food fraud in a holistic way. The project includes three distinct pillars, namely, a) the identification of data gaps in the food chain, b) the provision of methods, processes, and tools to detect and counter food fraud and c) the effective cross border collaboration of public authorities through accurate and trustworthy information sharing. WATSON will rely upon emerging technologies (AI, IoT, DLT, etc.) enabling transparency within supply chains through the development of a rigorous, traceability regime, and novel tools for rapid, non-invasive, on-the-spot analysis of food products. The results will be demonstrated in 6 use cases:

· Prevention of counterfeit alcoholic beverages
· Preservation of the authenticity of PGI honey
· On-site authenticity check and traceability of olive oil
· The identification of possible manipulations at all stages of the meat chain
· The improved traceability of high-value products in cereal and dairy chain
· Combat of salmon counterfeiting

Project goals

The WATSON project aims to achieve the following Objectives (Obj):

Obj1 – DESIGN and DEVELOP a holistic traceability framework that will integrate data-driven services, intelligence-based toolsets and risk-estimation approaches, enabling food safety authorities and food chain stakeholders to identify at early stages and prevent fraudulent activities while improving food products' traceability.

Obj2 – VALIDATE and demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed WATSON methodological framework and toolset through 6 validation campaigns in 6 different subsectors of the European food system that will pave the way for rapid uptake of the proposed framework and its systemic solutions, with the active engagement of several food chain stakeholders.

Obj3 – ADVANCE the inspection and control capabilities of food safety authorities through robust, reliable and rapid methods and toolsets based on emerging technologies that ensure traceability and prevent fraudulent activities in the food chain.

Obj4 – ENSURE wide communication and scientific dissemination of the innovative WATSON results to the research, academic, and international community, raising awareness and promoting multi-stakeholder cooperation and information-sharing in order to tackle fraudulent activities in the food chain.

Obj5 – MAINSTREAM project results towards relevant policy making organisations and standardisation bodies in order to foster science-enabled policy reforms related to traceability and authenticity in food systems aiming to increase the global competitiveness of the European food sector.

Our input

Our role includes providing a risk assessment engine capable of quantifying the risk of complex and uncertain food systems. Along these lines, our in-house risk engine that was developed during previous research (e.g., HARMONIA and HYPERION projects) will be extended to be applicable to the food fraud problem and to be interfaced with the WATSON early warning system. We will also participate actively in the organization & implementation of the project's pilot demonstrations and the design & development of the WATSON exploitation plans.

Find out more

More detailed information and news regarding the WATSON project can be found on the project's website: https://watsonproject.eu/
Contact us to discuss how we could help your organisation.