Dr. Chris Baker from the New Bunswick University and Senior Data Scientist, and machine learning expert Dr. Brett Drury are conducting research on the adoption of AgriSemantics for food security. As part of this research they have developed a questionnaire and need the input of subjects who work with agricultural data. 

Access the questionnare here. 

The results will form part of an upcoming publication on the topic. Find out more below.

Introduction

Agrisemantics allows the meaning of specific concepts in agricultural data to be clearly defined and understood by organisations who consume or produce data in the agricultural supply chain. This can be achieved with publicly available resources such as taxonomies, ontologies and thesauri which when created for agriculture are collectively referred to as Agrisemantics. These resources have been available for at least the last twenty years. The adoption of these resources by the agricultural sector has been limited and at best uneven in quality or performance. This study is designed to understand why the adoption of Agrisemantics is stymied.

Project Aims

The main aim of this project is to gain an understanding of the commonalities of adoption of Agrisemantics of all communities. From these common themes we wish to identify the drivers and roadblocks to the adoption of AgriSemantics in private industry as well as possible blindspots in the current development of publicly available resources. A secondary aim of this study is to publicise Agrisemantics to decision makers. The current COVID crisis has exposed the fragility of Agricultural Supply Chains. Agrisemantics facilities interoperability and has the potential to distribute the risk by allowing the ad-hoc integration of small suppliers into larger supply chain systems. This distribution of risk removes single points of failure in Supply Chains which are created by small numbers of large suppliers. However many decision makers are unaware of this. It is hoped that this study will raise awareness how Agrisemantics can benefit Agricultural companies.

Methodology

The research methodology uses in person interviews and a questionnaire to elicit opinions about:

1. The adoption of AgriSemantics in private industry and the public sector
2. The flaws in current AgriSemantic public resources.
3. How does funding impede or enable AgriSemantic projects
4. Is there any incentive for knowledge transfer from publicly funded projects to private industry.
5. Is there any pressure from government agencies to force private industry to adopt standards.
6. The measurable benefit of semantics resources and technologies to the targeted goals of researchers and business decision makers.

The interview process is a free form interview where the interviewee expresses their opinion about the core themes as well issues that they think is important.

The study is interested with interviewing people with the following profiles:

1. Individuals who approve funding for AgriSemantic projects
2. Individuals who have served on committees that set funding criteria for Agriculture
3. Innovation projects
4. Technical people who work with data integration on day to day basis
5. Project Managers
6. CEOs of AgriBusiness Companies
7. NGOs who produce publicly available semantic resources
8. Academics
9. Technical professionals serving on committees tasked with the development of standards supporting interoperability.
10. Agribusiness entrepreneurs
11. Supply chain professionals

Study Outputs

The study aims to produce a high quality policy paper which seeks to influence all levels of the Agrisemantic, and Agricultural communities, and put Agrisemantics front and centre in the current debate about food security and stability of the food supply chain.