Background.
Global Food Supply Chains (FSC) have been posing risks due to contamination, adulteration, and fraudulent behavior. These issues compromise consumer safety and damage customers' trust. These have led to a substantial rise in the demand for transparency, with traceability serves as a key enabler. Despite its importance, the reality is that complete traceability is more the exception than the rule.

A significant barrier lies in the internal traceability (within company or factory) system, which is often non-transparent and asymmetric, posing a serious threat to the security and reliability of the information. While digitalization offers promising solutions, many organizations continue to rely on conventional systems, or face interoperability or integration issues when digital systems are implemented. There is a high urgency to address these current issues to make traceability more efficient and effective.

Problem.
This research focuses on the category of infant nutrition (baby formula). In this area, transparency is much more important due to the high-risk nature of the consumer group and the relatively small number of companies, which makes the supply chain more susceptible to disruptions. From an academic perspective, there is limited research on frameworks for adopting digital traceability, particularly for internal traceability. To the author’s knowledge, empirical evidence is limited, with no studies specifically addressing traceability in infant formula manufacturing.

From a business standpoint (case study), traceability practices vary widely across factories. Some factories in the studied company use standardized digital systems ("core tools"), while others rely on legacy or manual methods. These differences reflect varying levels of digital maturity and hinder the company’s transparency goals. Inconsistent data management adds pressure on factories to meet traceability standards efficiently. Therefore, this study aims to address the need for a unified approach by answering the question: “What conceptual framework can be developed for the factories in infant formula manufacturing to adopt Digital Traceability tools to achieve Transparency?”.

Research Approach.
We utilized the information system's Design Science Research (DSR) framework of \textcite{hevner_three_2007}. The framework consists of three contexts: Knowledge, Environment, and Design. The formulation of the framework follows Process Pattern Models.

Conceptual Framework of Digital Traceability Adoption.
The conceptual framework for the adoption of digital traceability, as the output of this research, emphasizes the adoption process. It is used as the 'way of thinking' to understand the current situation and what steps to take ahead. The framework consists of three main parts: i) Factors affecting digital traceability adoption (drivers and challenges), ii) Maturity Level Assessment, and iii) Adoption Stages.

Future Research.
This research has contributed to the first steps of digital adoption for internal traceability in FSC. There are several areas recommended. First, to further investigate the relationship between traceability and transparency across different levels of traceability maturity level. Second, the relationship between drivers and adoption outcomes remains underexplored, though this study hints that initial motivations can influence current traceability levels. Third, future research should investigate integrating internal factory traceability with external supply chain traceability, as current literature treats them separately. Finally, the study has identified the components, but solution and more practical use of the frameworks are much more to be explored. For government: Access to emerging technologies enhances digital traceability, this emphasizes the importance for industry and academia collaboration.

Novelty.
The novelty of this thesis is in its integration of Design Science Research (DSR) and the Process Pattern Model (PPM) to develop a practical, systematic framework for adopting digital traceability tools. Unlike prior studies that emphasize external traceability or emerging technologies such as blockchain, this research focuses on the underexplored domain of 'internal traceability' using widely deployed manufacturing systems (MES, PMS, WMS, LIMS, ERP). It further contributes to academic inquiry into infant formula traceability, a niche but high-risk segment that is scarce in the existing literature. By combining theoretical insights with empirical evidence, the framework emphasizes the adoption process, incorporates post-adoption considerations, and delivers guidance for factory-level implementation.