RFID in 2006: A Story of Extremes

Hot Countries for RFID
IDTechEx keeps a close eye on which countries are eagerly adopting RFID and which are not. Our sources include intensive traveling, conferences, literature searches and our IDTechEx RFID Knowledgebase of more than 2,400 case studies covering more than 2,600 organizations and 91 countries (http://www.rfidbase.com). The results are rather surprising.
First, the US is the greatest adopter, with by far the largest number of cases of RFID in action and orders that are often the world’s largest by value. It has even pulled ahead in the last year, with over 840 recorded projects. More surprising is the UK holding second place by number of cases, though not the money spent, where China has more claim to fame and Korea and Japan are strong rivals.
The top ten countries by number of case studies are shown below but it did not look like this only one year ago. China and Korea have jumped up a notch and, remarkably, Australia has jumped from number ten to number seven. When we saw the unusual activity in Australia we focused research onto the region for a new report RFID in Australasia 2007-2017 (see www.idtechex.com) and we reveal some of the results here. New Zealand is a follower, with the exception of the work of Fonterra, the world’s largest milk cooperative.
What is going on in Australia? The rapid advance of Australia in RFID is on a broad front, from books in libraries to tagging of humans in hospitals, but one could say that about many countries. What sets Australia apart from most of its peers are aspects such as the legal requirement to tag cattle and racehorses, and the trials and rollouts of tagging fish, tomatoes and other foods by its vibrant food industry. Australia will not stop there. It is likely to introduce legislation to tag all four legged livestock ahead of most other countries. With the major trading blocs finding reasons to protect their food industries, external suppliers such as Australia, with the world’s largest population of sheep, must be beyond suspicion. RFID is a part of that.