Olds College Brewery has created a unique traceable beer using blockchain technology and barley.  Launching Barley Trail, their first fully transparent beer using malt barley grown on the Olds College Smart Farm with Decisive Farming and Grain Discovery’s technology, Field to Glass is the brainchild of Decisive Farming, Grain Discovery, Red Shed Malting and the Olds College Smart Farm.   Patrons will be able to scan the QR code located on every can and learn about the Barley Trail journey from start to the finished product in their hands. 

My Farm Manager and Croptivity will provide teams with the tools to manage field tasks and inventory, along with the ability to auto-capture records. Once the barley was harvested, it was filtered through the steeping, germination and kiln process from Red Shed Malting. Once the malting process was completed, the barley was sent back to the on-campus Olds College Brewery for brewing and packaging. 

Barley Trail lager is a fully traceable beer packaged with a QR code. “Through the use of Decisive Farmings farm management technology — My Farm Manager and Croptivity — the entire process was monitored and recorded,” said Brianna Gratton, SmartAg Techgromist, Olds College. “This software was used by the Smart Farm team to track and record the process of growing barley from seeding, to processing at Red Shed Malting, to the final product being brewed and packaged at the on-campus Olds College Brewery.”

Barley Trail is currently available for purchase in cans or growler filling at the Olds College Brewery retail store and at select Co-op Wine Spirits Beer liquor stores locations in Calgary, Alberta.