Looking through a responsible innovation lens at uneven engagements with digital farming

Abstract

This article extends social science research on big data and data platforms through a focus on agriculture, which has received relatively less attention than other sectors like health. In this paper, I use a responsible innovation framework to move attention to the social and ethical dimensions of big data “upstream,” to decision-making in the very selection of agricultural data and the building of its infrastructures. I draw on original empirical material from qualitative interviews with North American designers and engineers to make visible and analyze the normative aspects of their technical decisions. Social actors shaping innovation hold a narrow set of values about good farming and good technology and their data selection choices privilege large-scale and commodity crop farmers by focusing on agronomic crop data and data mapping unusable to organic growers. Enabling engagement among a wide variety of food system actors, not just already powerful ones, and attending to a greater diversity of values would be essential to underpin a responsible digital agricultural transition.