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Interoperable Traceability Mapper for Sustainable Supply Chains

Abstract: Can you explain the whole project and its expected outcome(s).

Research: main deliverable is a detailed comparison table

Standards (GS1, IEEE Digital Assets and Blockchain, W3C Verifiable Credentials, etc.)

Schemas (

GS1 XML⁠

and EPCIS2, Valueflo.ws, OLCA, DePIN IoT feeds, etc.)

Mapping solutions like

LinkML⁠

, XSLT or SPARQL-Generate (for RDF), JSonata (or any from

this Interoperable EU article⁠

)

Serialization formats (xml, json-ld)

Development:

Mapper from/to usual schemas

If needed: Ideal Intermediate Model

Innovation:

NFT Marketplace

Insights (product, brand)

Check against conditions

Filter

Certificates and compliance

Verified credentials

access to gated content (e.g. review form, decrypted recipe text)

proofs and debates

forum

Trustless legal & Smart Contracts

Usage and resell licence auto-compliance

Async payment & delivery

LCIA insights

See and optimize possibilities

Supply chains across industries are under increasing pressure to be more transparent, sustainable, and adaptive. However, the wide variety of existing traceability schemas and standards create data silos and incompatibilities, hindering innovation in areas like sustainability assessments, intelligent procurement, and decentralized financing models.

By developing a unified, open-source traceability mapper that connects these diverse schemas (e.g., GS1, REA/Valueflo.ws, IoT sensors), complying to relevant W3C and IEEE standards, this project will unlock several critical capabilities.

Then, we apply the intermediate schema and mapper to develop the back-end and front-end for :

Decentralized Ownership and Transfer of Digital Product Passports via RWA NFTs

Use Case: Implement decentralized Digital Product Passports (DPP) that can transfer ownership dynamically through the blockchain. The DPP would contain all traceability and environmental impact data, and transfer of the passport would occur when the product changes hands (e.g., resale or donation).

Example: A DPP for a mattress includes data on durability, recycled content, and remanufacturing possibilities. When the mattress is resold, the DPP transfers to the new owner, maintaining transparency across its lifecycle.

Benefits: Ensures that product traceability is maintained across multiple ownerships, fostering a second-hand economy while ensuring trust and transparency.

With your donation, we would also develop the following Proof of Concepts:

1. Insight pages

About product (Digital Product Passport’s model/batch/item level)

About brand (reputation, performance)

Circular Economy Tracking (Reusability, Reparability, and Upgradability)

Use Case: Enable traceability systems to track products' reusability, reparability, and upgradability. This includes recording data on how easily a product can be repaired, whether spare parts are available, and whether the product is designed for remanufacturing or upgrading.

Example: A smartphone manufacturer can provide data on how easily each component of their phones can be replaced or upgraded, ensuring that the product lifecycle is maximized and reducing electronic waste.

Benefits: Supports the circular economy by helping stakeholders understand the potential for product reuse and refurbishment, extending product life cycles.

2. Check against conditions

Intelligent Procurement and Utilization of Spare Capacities

Problem: Traditional procurement processes are inefficient and lack transparency, making it hard to optimize resource usage and identify spare capacities in manufacturing or logistics.

Solution: By connecting data from EPCIS and REA, the traceability mapper will facilitate intelligent procurement, where buyers can match supply chain needs with verified providers in real-time, ensuring that spare capacities are utilized efficiently. This will also enable dynamic adjustments to procurement based on availability and real-time traceability.

Impact: Reduces waste and resource inefficiencies, driving both economic and environmental sustainability in industries like manufacturing and logistics.

Smart Certificates and Compliance

Use Case: Smart certificates can be issued based on traceability data to ensure that products comply with environmental standards like recycled content, water efficiency, and the presence of substances of concern. These certificates can be linked to blockchain records, ensuring they are tamper-proof, transparent, and available to all stakeholders.

Example: A textile company can automatically receive a "Sustainable Fabric" certificate when traceability data proves that recycled materials constitute 70% of the product. The certificate would be dynamically updated as the supply chain evolves.

Benefits: This enhances consumer trust and helps companies meet regulatory requirements while showcasing their commitment to sustainability.

3. Verified Credentials

Automated Compliance and Reporting for Regulatory Standards

Use Case: Automate the generation of regulatory compliance reports for each vertical (e.g., energy-related products, chemicals) by integrating traceability data with legal and compliance frameworks. This could include real-time reporting to regulators or stakeholders on compliance with environmental and safety standards.

Example: A chemicals manufacturer can automatically generate and submit compliance reports for the presence of substances of concern, aligned with REACH or other relevant standards.

Benefits: Reduces administrative burden, ensures regulatory compliance, and helps companies avoid penalties by maintaining a transparent record of adherence to standards.

Spare Capacity and Intelligent Resource Matching

Use Case: Leverage real-time traceability data to identify and match spare capacities in manufacturing or logistics networks. By identifying idle resources or unused production capacity, companies can optimize their operations and reduce waste.

Example: A footwear manufacturer identifies idle machines capable of producing additional footwear components and offers their use to a partner company in need of production capacity.

Benefits: Optimizes resource use, reduces waste and downtime, and enhances collaboration between companies to maximize the efficiency of global supply chains.

Sharing Classified Data with Current Owners Only (Privacy-Preserving Traceability)

Use Case: Some supply chain data, such as specific environmental impact assessments or sensitive product ingredients, needs to be shared only with authorized stakeholders (e.g., current owners, regulators). Implement privacy-preserving mechanisms like zero-knowledge proofs or decentralized identifiers (DIDs) that enable stakeholders to access classified data without exposing sensitive details to the broader public.

Example: A company tracking chemicals in paint products can share the presence of substances of concern only with regulatory bodies or specific buyers, without disclosing the full chemical composition publicly.

Benefits: This protects sensitive data while maintaining trust and compliance with industry standards, fostering secure and transparent collaboration.

Stakeholder Forum for Collaborative Decision-Making

Use Case: A decentralized stakeholder forum can be implemented using smart contracts and governance mechanisms. This enables manufacturers, suppliers, regulators, and consumers to collaboratively discuss and vote on decisions about supply chain optimizations, sustainability initiatives, or new compliance requirements.

Example: A forum could be used for decision-making on how to best reuse water in the manufacturing of ICT products, ensuring that resource use and efficiency are optimized across the supply chain.

Benefits: Encourages collaboration, transparency, and shared responsibility, empowering stakeholders to actively participate in the sustainability transition.

4. Match legal & Smart Contracts

Contract Variables’ Traceability Mapping & Solidity Translation

Problem: Current traceability systems lack the ability to dynamically generate and enforce contracts based on real-time supply chain data.

Solution: The project will include a contract module that automatically generates smart contracts in Solidity from mapped traceability data. This module will ensure that legally binding agreements can be automatically enforced through blockchain-based contracts, reducing paperwork and streamlining contract execution.

Impact: Improves trust and security in multi-party supply chains, enabling transparent and self-executing agreements.

Async Payment and Delivery Models

Problem: Traditional traceability systems don’t support modern payment mechanisms like crowdfunding, deferred payments (e.g., "pay in 30 days"), or automated conditional payments.

Solution: The mapper will integrate event-driven smart contracts that enable async payment models, ensuring that payments can be made based on real-time traceability data (e.g., goods delivered or milestones achieved). Crowdfunding platforms and B2B buyers will have secure, traceable assurance of product fulfillment before releasing payments.

Impact: This fosters trust-minimized and flexible financing models that are especially useful in fragmented global supply chains, reducing risks for investors and buyers.

Rewarding Contributors with Revenue Sharing

Problem: There is no effective, transparent mechanism to reward contributors (e.g., manufacturers, suppliers, backers) proportionally based on their inputs to a project.

Solution: The traceability mapper will support smart contracts that automate revenue sharing based on contribution tracking (via REA) across the supply chain. Contributors will receive real-time payouts proportional to their verified contributions once revenue is generated.

Impact: Drives fair trade practices and incentivizes participation in sustainable supply chains, fostering a collaborative, fair ecosystem.

5. LCIA insights and recommendations

Accurate Lifecycle Impact Assessment (LCIA) with OpenLCA

Problem: Traceability data is often incompatible with existing lifecycle impact assessment (LCIA) tools like OpenLCA, leading to inaccurate environmental and social impact assessments.

Solution: The traceability mapper will harmonize data from multiple sources (e.g., EPCIS events, REA economic activities) and automatically feed this data into LCIA tools, enabling precise and real-time sustainability assessments. This will drive industries toward achieving better carbon footprint, resource consumption, and social responsibility targets.

Impact: Improves the accuracy of sustainability metrics across industries, enhancing transparency and compliance with environmental regulations.

Automatic Lifecycle Impact Offsetting via Smart Contracts

Use Case: Develop smart contracts that automatically trigger offsetting mechanisms (e.g., carbon offsets, water restoration) based on lifecycle impact data. As traceability data is captured, smart contracts calculate the negative environmental impacts (e.g., carbon emissions, water consumption) and automatically allocate funds to offset these impacts.

Example: If a steel manufacturer generates 10 tons of CO2, a smart contract automatically purchases carbon credits to offset the emissions.

Benefits: Promotes sustainability by embedding automated environmental responsibility into the supply chain.

Strategic Alignment with Commons and NLnet Goals

This project aligns strongly with NLnet's focus on open, decentralized, and privacy-respecting infrastructure for a more transparent and sustainable digital society:

Open Standards and Interoperability: By creating an open-source interoperability tool, this project promotes commons-based innovation, reducing reliance on proprietary supply chain solutions and empowering industries with transparent and collaborative infrastructure.

Sustainability: The focus on lifecycle impact assessment, combined with intelligent resource use and contributor rewards, directly supports the green transformation of industries by enabling measurable improvements in sustainability.

Resilience: Integrating smart contracts with traceability data ensures that supply chains remain resilient and adaptable to dynamic changes, contributing to decentralized decision-making and automated compliance.

Decentralization: The use of blockchain and smart contracts promotes decentralized, trustless interactions across the supply chain, reducing dependency on centralized intermediaries.

Conclusion

This project will result in an open-source tool that unifies traceability data across multiple industries, enabling sustainable, resilient, and transparent supply chains. It addresses critical gaps in interoperability, lifecycle impact assessment, intelligent procurement, and decentralized finance, unlocking strategic potential for industries transitioning towards sustainability. The tool will be a public good, promoting the commons by empowering stakeholders to collaborate in a transparent, secure, and environmentally responsible way.

By incorporating these use cases, the traceability system would become a powerful, multi-purpose tool for enabling sustainability, transparency, and trust across diverse industries. These features align closely with Digital Product Passport knowledge and extend traceability to support the circular economy, decentralized data sharing, sustainable procurement, and intelligent resource use. Together, they provide far-reaching strategic impact, helping industries transition to more resilient, open, and sustainable business models while addressing the key challenges outlined in the NLnet Commons Conservancy Fund.

By supporting this project, NLnet and the Commons Conservancy Fund will directly contribute to creating a more open, fair, and sustainable economy, benefiting industries and society at large.

⁠

Have you been involved with projects or organisations relevant to this project before? And if so, can you tell us a bit about your contributions?

What are significant technical challenges you expect to solve during the project, if any?

Map complex schemas

Compare your own project with existing or historical efforts.

LEDGER project’s DPP (Interfacer by Dyne.org)

OriginTrail

Circularise

For your project, you can expand the use cases to include additional capabilities that are particularly relevant to secure, transparent, and decentralized supply chain management, sustainability tracking, and collaborative governance. Here are some advanced use cases to include:

### 1. **Smart Certificates for Verifiable Claims**

- **Use Case**: Issue and verify certificates (e.g., **organic**, **Fair Trade**, **ISO**, or **carbon offset**) that are cryptographically secured and tamper-proof.

- **How It Works**: Certificates are issued as **Verifiable Credentials (VCs)**, using a blockchain-based system where each claim is digitally signed by an accredited authority. These credentials can be stored in the traceability mapper and linked to specific products or processes.

- **Impact**:

- **Trust**: Ensures that certificates are verifiable and cannot be falsified.

- **Transparency**: Consumers and partners can verify certification status in real-time.

- **Efficiency**: Reduces manual verification processes and enables **automated audits** for compliance.

- **Example**: A clothing manufacturer receives a **GOTS (Global Organic Textile Standard)** certificate, which is stored on the blockchain and tied to the traceability of each garment. Retailers and consumers can verify that the product meets sustainability standards before purchase.

### 2. **Classified Data Sharing with Current Owners Only**

- **Use Case**: Ensure that sensitive supply chain data (e.g., pricing, production details, proprietary processes) is **shared securely** and only with authorized parties who currently own or manage the resource.

- **How It Works**: Using **decentralized identity (DID)** systems and **selective disclosure** via **Zero-Knowledge Proofs (ZKPs)**, sensitive data can be shared **only with current stakeholders** who have the right to access it, without exposing the full dataset to external parties.

- **Impact**:

- **Security**: Protects classified data from unauthorized access, even in multi-party supply chains.

- **Compliance**: Meets data privacy regulations (e.g., **GDPR** or **CCPA**) by minimizing data exposure.

- **Trust**: Ensures that suppliers and buyers can share sensitive information without the risk of data leakage.

- **Example**: A supplier can share production metrics with a manufacturer during the active delivery phase, but the data is hidden from competitors or future stakeholders after the transaction is complete.

### 3. **Real-Time Environmental and Social Impact Tracking**

- **Use Case**: **Track and report real-time environmental and social impact metrics** (e.g., carbon footprint, water usage, labor conditions) across the supply chain.

- **How It Works**: IoT sensors and blockchain-based records provide continuous data updates on environmental and social metrics. The traceability system integrates with **LCIA tools** like OpenLCA to dynamically update the impact reports as products move through the supply chain.

- **Impact**:

- **Sustainability**: Companies can ensure that they meet environmental targets and reduce their carbon footprint.

- **Compliance**: Automated impact assessments ensure adherence to **ESG** (Environmental, Social, Governance) reporting requirements.

- **Market Differentiation**: Enables companies to **showcase sustainability credentials** in real-time, improving consumer trust.

- **Example**: A company in the aluminum sector can automatically update its carbon footprint as raw materials are processed, enabling real-time reporting to regulatory bodies and environmentally conscious customers.

### 4. **Dynamic Pricing and Incentive Mechanisms**

- **Use Case**: Enable **dynamic pricing models** and **incentive structures** that adapt based on real-time traceability data (e.g., early delivery bonuses, penalties for late shipments, or resource scarcity).

- **How It Works**: Smart contracts automate dynamic pricing adjustments based on supply chain performance. For example, if spare capacity is available, suppliers may offer lower prices to quickly fill it. Similarly, if demand spikes, prices may rise to reflect scarcity.

- **Impact**:

- **Efficiency**: Optimizes resource utilization and helps companies adjust pricing in real-time.

- **Incentives**: Creates a market-driven incentive structure that rewards efficient and sustainable practices.

- **Resilience**: Ensures companies can adapt quickly to changes in demand and supply.

- **Example**: A detergent manufacturer offers lower prices to buyers who can adjust their procurement schedules to use spare production capacity during off-peak times.

### 5. **Decentralized Contribution and Governance System**

- **Use Case**: Implement a **decentralized governance** model that allows contributors, suppliers, and stakeholders to vote or propose changes to processes, pricing, or resource allocation based on their contributions and stake in the supply chain.

- **How It Works**: Through **Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO)** mechanisms, supply chain stakeholders can participate in decision-making and be rewarded proportionally. **Votes** and **governance actions** can be tied directly to the traceability data, ensuring that the most engaged contributors have the greatest influence.

- **Impact**:

- **Fairness**: Encourages active participation by rewarding contributors proportionally to their input.

- **Transparency**: Voting and governance decisions are recorded on-chain, ensuring accountability.

- **Efficiency**: Streamlines decision-making processes by automating voting and execution of changes.

- **Example**: A textile producer allows suppliers and distributors to vote on sustainable material choices, with voting power determined by each party’s level of involvement in the supply chain.

### 6. **End-to-End Consumer Transparency and Trust Building**

- **Use Case**: Allow consumers to verify every step of the supply chain, from raw materials to finished products, ensuring **full transparency** and trust in product claims (e.g., ethical sourcing, environmental sustainability).

- **How It Works**: The traceability mapper provides a **consumer-facing interface** (e.g., through QR codes or mobile apps) that allows buyers to trace the entire lifecycle of a product, including where raw materials came from, the impact assessments, and who contributed to each stage of production.

- **Impact**:

- **Brand Loyalty**: Builds consumer trust through full transparency.

- **Market Differentiation**: Companies that provide end-to-end transparency can differentiate themselves in the market.

- **Compliance**: Ensures companies meet evolving consumer demand for **ethical and sustainable sourcing**.

- **Example**: A footwear company allows consumers to scan a QR code on a pair of shoes to view the entire traceability record, from the origin of raw materials to labor conditions and the final environmental impact of production.

### 7. **Waste Minimization and Circular Economy Support**

- **Use Case**: Support **waste minimization and circular economy initiatives** by enabling the traceability of products through multiple lifecycle phases (e.g., from production, to consumption, to recycling or repurposing).

- **How It Works**: Products are tracked from their original production, through their use, and into recycling or upcycling processes.

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