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Data Stewardship for Intelligent Farms: A Governance Framework for Ownership, Consent, Interoperability, and Farmer Control
Intelligent farming systems increasingly depend on data generated through sensors, machinery, satellites, digital platforms, advisory tools, farm management software, and artificial intelligence-enabled decision-support systems. These systems promise more precise monitoring, improved resource allocation, and better responsiveness to environmental and operational uncertainty. As farm operations become more data-intensive, farm data shift from being a by-product of agricultural activity to becoming a strategic asset within intelligent farming systems. This transformation creates governance problems that cannot be resolved through technical data management alone. Farm data raise contested questions about ownership, consent, access, interoperability, platform dependence, accountability, and farmer control. These questions are especially important because data generated on farms may be used beyond the original farming context for commercial analytics, platform development, benchmarking, insurance, input recommendation, credit scoring, or supply-chain governance. The objective of this article is to develop a data stewardship framework for intelligent farms. The framework is designed to clarify how ownership, consent, access, interoperability, accountability, and farmer-control mechanisms can be organised in ways that support responsible digital agricultural innovation. It treats data stewardship as a governance function that mediates between innovation, commercial data use, and the protection of farmers’ decision-making authority. The article is based on a governance framework synthesis  peer-reviewed articles published. It does not present new empirical data. Instead, it synthesises literature on digital agriculture, smart farming, agricultural data governance, platformisation, responsible innovation, interoperability, and farmer data rights to construct a practical and conceptual governance framework. The article maps farm data as a governance problem, analyses ownership and consent issues, examines interoperability and platform dependence, and proposes a stewardship framework for intelligent farms. Three tables summarise ownership and control issues, interoperability risks, and the proposed framework. Responsible intelligent farming requires data stewardship arrangements that protect farmer control while enabling trustworthy data sharing and innovation.
Journal of Intelligent Agriculture and Food Systems
Original Research | Open access | 15 March 2024 | Article: 6