For millennia, people have been using various means to preserve food, utilising everything from salt to smoke to heavy cubes of cut ice. But it was not until the early 1900s, with the invention of the electric refrigerator, that cold storage took off. It would quickly change food production practices, creating a more efficient system by which high-nutrient foods such as meat, dairy products, and fruits and vegetables could be transported safely to more parts of the world. People were able to distance themselves from their food sources without compromising their ability to find fresh, perishable products. Since then, several developments have continued to widen distribution and make it more efficient. As a result, refrigerated growth capacity has grown steadily as a result. Today, we have created a truly global food supply chain, a complex web of interconnected parts that work together to get food to people in communities around the world. At the core of that system is the cold chain.
read full article at the Economist
