5.1.3 How a shared, global identifier system supports interoperability across brands, retailers and recyclers

A proprietary, brand-specific identifier only ever means something to the brand that created it. A GTIN, by contrast, is designed to be read the same way by any GS1-connected system anywhere in the world, which is precisely the interoperability problem raised in the context of data governance (section 3.4.3): actors across a value chain cannot share data meaningfully unless they are identifying the same product the same way. GS1’s global reach is what allows a Portuguese manufacturer, a German retailer and a Dutch recycler to all resolve the same identifier to the same underlying record, without a bespoke integration between each pair of parties.

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