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Analysis of institutional authors

Bekkouche, SomiaAuthorDe-Magistris, TizianaAuthor

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December 17, 2025
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Digitalization in the European agri-food supply chain: a scoping review of traceability, transparency, and sustainability

Publicated to: Frontiers In Blockchain. 8 - 2025-11-21 8(), DOI: 10.3389/fbloc.2025.1701872

Authors:

Bekkouche, Somia; de-Magistris, Tiziana
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Unión Europea, Europa

Abstract

Introduction: Maintaining traceability within the food supply chain is key to ensuring food safety, quality, and regulatory compliance. In recent years, digital technologies—especially blockchain – have been adopted to enhance transparency and trust in ‘farm-to-fork’ traceability systems, reducing fraud risk and enhancing recall management and strengthening consumer trust. However, their adoption differs based on variability in technological readiness, economic viability, and regulatory requirements. Methods: This paper provides a scoping review of the application of such digital tools to enhance traceability throughout the European agri-food supply chain. being applied across the European agri-food supply chain to improve traceability. Following PRISMA-ScR guidelines, we searched multiple databases (Web of Science, ProQuest, IEEE Xplore, Alcorze) for relevant literature and included 60 peer-reviewed studies (primarily 2010–2025) that met our criteria (focus on blockchain, IoT, AI, or big data in European food supply chain traceability). Results and Discussion: Blockchain emerged as the most frequently studied technology for food traceability —appearing in over 40% of the selected studies —often deployed in combination with IoT sensors, RFID tags, or QR codes to create end-to-end transparency. These digital interventions are reported to strengthen traceability and consumer trust, improve supply chain efficiency, and support sustainability initiatives. However, adoption remains uneven. Most studies describe conceptual frameworks or pilot implementations rather than fully realized systems, and real-world deployment is hampered by interoperability challenges, scalability issues, regulatory uncertainties, and high costs. In conclusion, blockchain-based traceability shows great promise for the European food sector, but targeted efforts are needed to overcome it.
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Keywords

Cadena de suministro alimentarioEstudios bibliográficosEuropaTecnología digitalTrazabilidad de los alimentos

Quality index

Bibliometric impact. Analysis of the contribution and dissemination channel

The work has been published in the journal Frontiers In Blockchain due to its progression and the good impact it has achieved in recent years, according to the agency Scopus (SJR), it has become a reference in its field. In the year of publication of the work, 2025, it was in position , thus managing to position itself as a Q2 (Segundo Cuartil), in the category . Notably, the journal is positioned en el Cuartil Q3 for the agency WoS (JCR) in the category Computer Science, Information Systems.

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Impact and social visibility

From the perspective of influence or social adoption, and based on metrics associated with mentions and interactions provided by agencies specializing in calculating the so-called "Alternative or Social Metrics," we can highlight as of 2026-01-14:

  • The use, from an academic perspective evidenced by the Altmetric agency indicator referring to aggregations made by the personal bibliographic manager Mendeley, gives us a total of: 18.
  • The use of this contribution in bookmarks, code forks, additions to favorite lists for recurrent reading, as well as general views, indicates that someone is using the publication as a basis for their current work. This may be a notable indicator of future more formal and academic citations. This claim is supported by the result of the "Capture" indicator, which yields a total of: 16 (PlumX).

With a more dissemination-oriented intent and targeting more general audiences, we can observe other more global scores such as:

  • The Total Score from Altmetric: 9.
  • The number of mentions on the social network X (formerly Twitter): 2 (Altmetric).
  • The number of mentions in news outlets: 1 (Altmetric).

It is essential to present evidence supporting full alignment with institutional principles and guidelines on Open Science and the Conservation and Dissemination of Intellectual Heritage. A clear example of this is:

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Leadership analysis of institutional authors

This work has been carried out with international collaboration, specifically with researchers from: European Union.

There is a significant leadership presence as some of the institution’s authors appear as the first or last signer, detailed as follows: First Author (Bekkouche, Somia) and Last Author (De Magistris, Tiziana).

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Awards linked to the item

The author(s) declare that financial support was received for the research and/or publication of this article. This review is funded by the State agency project coming from the EU (next-generation EU/PRTR): development of blockchain based ecosystem that allows an improved position of small producers of honey on local and international markets (TECHONEY), funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and EU (next-generation EU/PRTR). CITA grant reference PCI2022–132917).
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