How Are Smallholder Farmers Involved in Digital Agriculture in Developing Countries: A Case Study from China

Abstract

Digital transformation in agricultural practices may lead to a "digital divide" between small and large farms, owing to the characteristics and availability of digital technology. This paper sought to use a case study in Chongzhou County, Sichuan Province in China, to analyze how smallholder farmers in developing countries access such digital agriculture and share the benefits of digital agricultural transformation. Small farmers may own a larger scale farm through forming cooperatives; they are also indirectly involved in digital agriculture through agriculture outsourcing. The outsourcing market is expected to grow, which will allow for the evolution of a digital agricultural service platform, the development of a digital agricultural business organization consortium, and the continued expansion of a healthy digital ecology. This paper revealed important policy implications, stemming from the fact that the implementation of inclusive digital agriculture relies on two key shifts: (1) transformation from land scale operations to service scale operations and (2) from inclusive technological progress to inclusive organization innovation.

An Assessment of Social Media Usage Patterns and Social Capital: Empirical Evidence From the Agricultural Systems of China

“…Therefore, safety and privacy should be completely safeguarded. In China, several farmers are unaware of this issue that online equipment necessary for digital agriculture might provide exposure to virtual hazards (Xie et al, 2021). The results in Table 5 show that the research hypotheses of the structural model of this paper are supported and the three modes of social, hedonic, and cognitive use of SM have a significant positive effect on both bonding and bridging social capital of agricultural entrepreneurs.…”

“…The digital transformation in the agricultural industry has several advantages to the agricultural entrepreneurs, involving enhanced market clarity, greater farm efficiency, and more economical logistics. In specific, under the public health issues produced by the COVID-19 pandemic, digital agriculture has aided emerging economies to survive the pandemic's unfavorable impacts on supply chains and food production (Xie et al, 2021).…”

Features of the choice of information technologies for the development of agriculture

“…The main trend in modern agriculture is the massive introduction of information and digital technologies, the creation of digital twins of fields, the development of technological schemes that allow to fully automate field work, keeping animals, and make optimal decisions. These processes affect both large agricultural holdings and small farmers [1,2]. Digital agriculture allows you to reduce costs, increase plant productivity, animal productivity, and reduce the environmental burden on the environment.…”

Integrated-Smart Agriculture: Contexts and Assumptions for a Broader Concept

“…The technological progress opens several opportunities for the different socioeconomic sectors, including the farming sector, in a perspective of smart agriculture, but brings, also, various challenges [1] threats that may compromise the sustainability of the development process worldwide. One example of this paradigm is the internet of things (IoT).…”