To support the uptake of digital tools in the agricultural sector, it is required to thoroughly understand how digital agriculture is advocated & animated in the interface between the advisory and farming communities. Therefore, Inagro (BE) supported the set-up of 4 focus group discussions, one in each geographic area (West Europe, Central Europe, South-East Europe and North-East Europe) in the end of 2020. The objective was to identify common “working-day” challenges faced by farmers across the different member states and to identify the digital advisory technologies which are best positioned to address them. Furthermore, the aim was to identify barriers for the uptake of interesting technologies, and how these barriers could be removed. Also, possibilities to transfer the advocacy and animation approaches to other contexts were discussed and in response to the different needs, attention was paid to the potential of piggy-backing on existing approaches.
In short, the solutions to remove barriers for uptake of digital tools are:
- Organization of working groups, learning networks, peer to peer learning, trainings, tutorials, webinars and demonstration at farms
- Develop DATs that also work offline for a certain period, or at least the basic functions
- Development of tools in cocreation with the sector could take into account both the needs related to the daily work of farmers and advisors.
- A (short) list with interesting/useful tools compiled by an independent advisor
- Direct online translation
- Development of an integrated platform or tools that communicate with each other
- Data security
Read the full deliverable here.