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Good morning. Seafood might seem like just another item in your freezer — but behind that label is a tangled web of boats, brokers, exporters, and unknowns. And it’s not just seafood. From coffee to cocoa, India’s small-scale producers are part of a global supply chain that often leaves them invisible — and undervalued.

On The Core Report: Weekend Edition, Govindraj Ethiraj sits down with Mark Kaplan, co-founder of Wholechain, to explore how blockchain-backed traceability is changing global trade. They discuss why supply chain trust now goes beyond just origin, how Algorand helps anchor proof and transparency, and why small producers with a mobile phone may hold the key to India’s next trade advantage.

THE CORE REPORT: WEEKEND EDITION

What’s Traceability Got To Do With Shrimp?

• Wholechain uses blockchain-backed supply chain tech to track food from farm to fork — starting with seafood and small-scale shrimp farms in India, Indonesia, and beyond.

• Why start with seafood? Because it’s the most fragmented, complex, and unstructured — the “Frank Sinatra test”: if you can do it there, you can do it anywhere.

How The System Works

• First-mile data often comes from co-op managers, not individual producers.
  Wholechain converts messy spreadsheets into structured, GS1-compliant data.

• Each product gets a “digital twin” that moves with it through the supply chain — from fisher to exporter to retailer.
  Every record is hashed on Algorand’s blockchain for transparency, tamper-proofing, and audit trails.

What Buyers Want — And Why Blockchain Helps

• Global buyers now demand more than just origin data — they want vessel type, fishing gear, even labour conditions.

• US and EU laws are raising the bar: if you're not traceable, you’re not tradable.
  Blockchain isn't a buzzword here — it's a quiet assurance system. Errors are logged, corrections are tracked, and trust is built in.

Not Just Seafood: The Method Scales

• Wholechain is expanding into beef, leather, grains, vanilla, coffee, cocoa, and shea butter.

• Their approach is commodity-agnostic: set the data standards → plug into supply chains → make it scalable.

• Backed by GS1 and aligned with UN Global Compact to promote equitable global trade.

Real Impact: What Transparency Changes

• Buyers feel more confident.

• Sellers see sales go up — especially in fragmented, smallholder-based markets.
  Transparency shortens sales cycles, boosts compliance, and strengthens brands in global markets.

As Mark Kaplan puts it:

Click below to watch the full podcast

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