Digital technology in Zambian agriculture: a scoping report

Abstract

Digital technologies in agriculture have been identified as a game changer in agrifood systems (IFPRI, 2020). Policy makers, researchers and corporate interests make claims about how digital technologies in agriculture are significant in making farming more productive, efficient and sustainable. In Zambia, agriculture remains a critical sector to achieve the country’s development goals. FAO states that digital technology is part of the solution to Zambia’s challenges in the agricultural sector. Zambia has not yet developed a policy on digitalisation in agriculture and most of the digital interventions in agriculture are done by non-state actors, or supported by parts of the state, but in silos. The lack of national policy and a strategy leads to fragmented interventions with very little impact in terms of shaping the course of digitalisation. Advancement of digital technologies in agriculture can cause negative effects including displacement of labour in agriculture, a boom in cybercrimes and data protection concerns, reproduction of entrenched inequities in the global systems, and lead to newforms of value-chain control and value extraction. With the range of potential benefits and risks, more needs to be done to understand, and inform the development of adequate governance of digital technologies in Zambian agriculture.