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- Convenors:
-
Ebenezer Ngissah
(Wageningen University and Research)
Tonny Kukeera (Alliance Manchester Business School, University of Manchester)
Nana Afranaa Kwapong (University of Lincoln)
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- Chair:
-
Katarzyna Cieslik
(University of Manchester)
- Discussant:
-
Matthew Ayamga
- Format:
- Paper panel
- Stream:
- Agriculture, rural livelihoods, food systems, and climate change
Short Abstract:
This panel explores why digital agriculture often fails smallholder farmers, focusing on systemic barriers like unreliable energy, inequity, and top-down approaches. It seeks solutions through inclusive innovation, local knowledge, and equitable governance for impactful, sustainable outcomes.
Description:
This panel critically examines the challenges and shortcomings of digital agriculture and ICT4D (Information and Communication Technologies for Development) initiatives, focusing on how to make these tools genuinely beneficial for smallholder farmers. While often celebrated as transformative for livelihoods and sustainability, many such initiatives fail to meet their promises due to structural barriers like inadequate infrastructure, unreliable energy access, and top-down implementation approaches. These obstacles frequently exclude smallholders, leaving them unable to act on advice provided by digital tools due to unmet material constraints. A significant yet underexplored challenge is the "digital-energy divide," where unreliable or absent energy access hampers the functionality of digital solutions, disproportionately affecting remote agricultural communities.
The panel invites submissions exploring why digital agriculture projects struggle to scale or sustain their impact in contexts of inequality and energy poverty. It also seeks proposals for inclusive innovations addressing these issues. Key questions include:
- Why do digital agriculture projects struggle to scale, or sustain their impact particularly in contexts of systemic inequality and energy poverty?
- How do these initiatives reinforce existing power imbalances?
- What ethical concerns arise when promoting tools without addressing material and energy barriers?
- How can local knowledge and decentralized renewable energy solutions shape tool design?
- What governance frameworks are needed for equitable access to digital tools and energy infrastructure?
By addressing these questions, the session aims to uncover failures and pathways to fulfill digital agriculture’s potential through integrated approaches to energy access, local knowledge, and inclusive innovation.