“How can we?” the need to direct research in digital agriculture towards capacities

Abstract

Concerns about digital agriculture reinforcing industrialised models of agriculture and power inequalities have been widely articulated. This paper uses directionalities, which are characterised by dominant and durable directions or pathways, to conceptualise this envisaged entrenchment. It argues that we need to anticipate and collect the evidence on which to govern digital agriculture technologies before such directionalities set in. To support this anticipatory need, the paper draws on findings from a research prioritisation exercise with stakeholders in the UK. It identifies and critically analyses two interconnecting meta-themes, organisational capacity and human capacity, which emerged inductively in the analysis of selected themes and priority research questions. In doing this, the paper widens the scope of enquiry about digital agriculture, by introducing ‘capacities’ as a new theoretical lens to examine how institutional structures and processes shape the utilisation of digital data, technologies and their underlying directionalities. The paper concludes by outlining the implications of this new perspective on directionalities and capacities for digital agriculture research in the UK and internationally.