Farmers' perception of the barriers that hinder the implementation of agriculture 4.0

Agriculture 4.0 can drive the growth of the agricultural production in emerging countries like Brazil, which is known as one of the primary food and meat producers worldwide, by offering a range of technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence (AI), Blockchain, and Machine Learning. However, the development of agriculture 4.0 in Brazil is a complex process, and more needs to be known about the real barriers that impact its adoption among the actors of the agricultural production chain. There is a need for more empirical studies about the perception of Brazilian farmers regarding the barriers that may compromise the successful path of agriculture 4.0. This article aims to validate the barriers that hinder the development of agriculture 4.0 in the agricultural production chain of Southern Brazil. Twenty-five barriers were chosen for validation based on a systematic review of the existing literature. A confirmatory factor analysis was performed using the statistical tests of Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin and Bartlett. Validation was performed through the perception of farmers (n = 347) located in the states of Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina, and Paraná. The data were collected from an online questionnaire that identified the importance of the barriers for the farmers in the sample. The most frequent and important barriers mentioned by the farmers were: lack of infrastructure, lack of solutions accessible to farmers, need to foster R&D and innovative business models, age group risk, and lack of efficacy in the data on the rural environment. This information can contribute to constructing a framework that seeks to overcome these barriers, thus facilitating the expansion and dissemination of agriculture 4.0 in Brazil. This study found that there is an open discussion about the barriers that hinder the adoption of agriculture 4.0 in the agricultural production chain. It will be necessary to further investigate the most prominent barriers in this study, as these may have significant impacts on other barriers. Thus, a systemic research that seeks to improve the conditions for implementing agriculture 4.0 is of great importance.