Ordering adoption: Materiality, knowledge and farmer engagement with precision agriculture technologies

Higgins, Vaughan; Bryant, Melanie; Howell, Andrea; Battersby, Jane

doi:10.1016/j.jrurstud.2017.08.011

Cited by 156 publications

(82 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…For example, one of the possible effects of frame ambivalence is that industry stakeholders stick to tried and trusted technological priorities, which may discourage the research, development and extension work that is important in translating smart farming technology to meet farm level needs (Eastwood et al 2017; Eastwood et al 2019a). This in turn can have negative implications for the capacity of growers in experimenting and tinkering with new technology, which is central for working with and working ‘around technology to make it adoptable on‐farm’ (Higgins et al 2017, p. 201). While frame ambivalence and switching afford industry sovereignty, this is not necessarily the case for frame incongruence in which industry extension priorities are clearly at cross purposes with the availability of smart farming technology support and the existing priorities of commercial agronomists.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These unequal relationships can contribute to commodification of information (Wolf and Buttel 1996; Wolf and Wood 1997), transfer of data ownership from farmers to digital agricultural companies leading to associated issues of data access (Bronson and Knezevic 2016; Carolan 2018), and problems with data privacy and security (Rotz et al 2019). Sociologists have also investigated how farmers negotiate asymmetrical power relations and find novel strategies to make smart farming technology locally workable through experimentation (Carolan 2018) and tinkering (Higgins et al 2017). Work by sociologists to date is important in highlighting the macro‐level political economic influences on smart farming development and implementation, and the farm‐level strategies for adaptation, negotiation or contestation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Framing Agri‐Digital Governance: Industry Stakeholders, Technological Frames and Smart Farming Implementation

Higgins

Bryant

2020

Sociologia Ruralis

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Meso-scale actors -such as farm advisors and other extension agents -are increasingly recognised as playing a critical role in managing farmer uncertainty associated with smart farming implementation. However, there has been limited research to date on how these actors navigate smart farming implementation within specific industries or commodity sectors. This article applies theoretical insights from the technological frames literature to investigate how meso-scale actors in the Australian rice industry frame smart farming technology implementation, and the ways in which relationships between frames variously afford and/or constrain industry sovereignty over implementation of technological change. Through analysis of our data, we reveal a complex relationship between participants' technological frames involving frame incongruence, frame ambivalence and frame switching. We argue that while development of a more integrated approach to enhancing the digital capacities of meso-scale actors advocated in the literature provides a way of addressing frame incongruence, more flexible strategies may be needed to address frame ambivalence and switching. Furthermore, we contend that those frame relationships supporting industry sovereignty -namely frame ambivalence and switching -may not always be conducive to the promotion of digital agency among meso-scale actors, and could in fact impose limits on smart farming implementation.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Framing Agri‐Digital Governance: Industry Stakeholders, Technological Frames and Smart Farming Implementation

Higgins

Bryant

2020

Sociologia Ruralis

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“…For example, Higgins et al . () recently entered the picture with a novel investigation into how farmers come to know and engage with precision technologies – specially, in terms of how they order them.…”

Section: Big Data and Precision Agriculture: Setting The Stagementioning

confidence: 99%

‘Smart’ Farming Techniques as Political Ontology: Access, Sovereignty and the Performance of Neoliberal and Not‐So‐Neoliberal Worlds

Carolan

2018

Sociologia Ruralis

115

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This article draws from data collected through interviews with the following groups: big data and/or precision farm equipment firm employees from numerous countries; commodity farmers in the USA who use big data; individuals from the US-based Right to Repair movement; and farmers associated with Farm Hack from the USA and the UK. With this as the empirical backdrop, the author interrogates the concept of 'access' by way of the phenomena of justice, ontology, and claims making -emergent themes to come out of the qualitative data. This in turn allows the author to conceptually, analytically, and empirically unpack the concept into the following three categories: access, property, and sovereignty. A framework then emerges to talk about these socio-technical assemblages in terms of what they do and the political ontologies they engender, recognising, for instance, that while access can afford individuals and groups benefits it can also detract from an individual's and/or group's ability to flourish. Being able to identify those practices of agro-digital governance that afford sovereignty can inform policies and programmes by nurturing an understanding the worlds they make possible.

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“…It has been argued that smart farming will reshape the practice of farming, with less 'hands-on' management and a more data-driven approach (Eastwood et al 2012). Different skills will be required across the farming team to enact and adapt smart farming technologies (Eastwood et al 2017b;Higgins et al 2017), along with adapted advisory structures, potentially leading to displaced farm staff and service providers. Such changes could have a major impact on the cultural fabric of what it means to be a farmer (Burton et al 2012;Carolan 2016), with the independence of managing 'your farm, your way' replaced with a far more structured and scrutinised approach, for example through detailed monitoring by agricultural equipment makers, input suppliers, processors and retailers (Bronson and Knezevic 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Managing Socio-Ethical Challenges in the Development of Smart Farming: From a Fragmented to a Comprehensive Approach for Responsible Research and Innovation

Eastwood

Klerkx

Ayre

et al. 2017

J Agric Environ Ethics

225

229

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Smart farming (also referred to as digital farming, digital agriculture and precision agriculture) has largely been driven by productivity and efficiency aims, but there is an increasing awareness of potential socio-ethical challenges. The responsible research and innovation (RRI) approach aims to address such challenges but has had limited application in smart farming contexts. Using smart dairying research and development (R&D) in New Zealand (NZ) as a case study, we examine the extent to which principles of RRI have been applied in NZ smart dairying development and assess the broader lessons for RRI application in smart farming. We draw on insights from: a review of research on dairy technology use in NZ; interviews with smart dairying stakeholders; and the application of an analytical framework based on RRI dimensions. We conclude that smart dairying R&D and innovation activities have focused on technology development and on-farm use without considering socio-ethical implications and have excluded certain actors such as citizens and consumers. This indicates that readiness to enact RRI in this context is not yet optimal, and future RRI efforts require leadership by government or dairy sector organisations to fully embed RRI principles in the guidelines for large R&D project design (what has also been referred to as 'RRI maturity'). More broadly, enacting RRI in smart farming requires initial identification of RRI readiness in a given sector or country and devising a roadmap and coherent project portfolio to support capacity building for enacting RRI.

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Ordering adoption: Materiality, knowledge and farmer engagement with precision agriculture technologies

Cited by 156 publications

References 38 publications

Framing Agri‐Digital Governance: Industry Stakeholders, Technological Frames and Smart Farming Implementation

Framing Agri‐Digital Governance: Industry Stakeholders, Technological Frames and Smart Farming Implementation

‘Smart’ Farming Techniques as Political Ontology: Access, Sovereignty and the Performance of Neoliberal and Not‐So‐Neoliberal Worlds

Managing Socio-Ethical Challenges in the Development of Smart Farming: From a Fragmented to a Comprehensive Approach for Responsible Research and Innovation

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