Framing the response to IoT in agriculture: A discourse analysis.

A technology in smart farming, the Internet of Things (IoT), is predicted to continue altering farm life by introducing opportunities and obstacles. However, there are limited studies on how farmers' views of IoT influence their decision-making regarding technology adoption. To understand what characterises farmers' experiences with IoT, we conducted a discourse analysis of 32 interviews with farmers in Ontario. Discourse analysis was used to understand the range of meanings associated with IoT by farmers. We find that two main discourses are present (1) the extent to which IoT was viewed as useful/helpful vs not useful/unhelpful and (2) the extent to which IoT was viewed as being their choice. The results indicate that farmers respond to IoT in four categories: embrace, accept, ignore, and caution. This paper contributes to the literature by categorising the farmers' responses to IoT implementation and highlighting why farmers adopt these categories. Current literature recognizes that diagnosing the current readiness and use of innovations is a proxy for their readiness to scale. Understanding how farmers view opportunities enabled by IoT and how they experience the diffusion of IoT is a foundation for suggesting recommendations for technology improvement and development in agriculture. [Display omitted] • Internet of Things is predicted to continue to alter farm life. • There are limited studies on how farmer's views of IoT influence adoption. • We conducted a discourse analysis of 32 interviews with farmers in Ontario. • Two main discourses were identified. The results indicate that farmers respond to IoT in four categories. • This work contributes by categorising the farmers response to perceived pressures and why farmers adopt these categories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]