Digital innovation ecosystems in agri-food: An expert assessment of global trends and developments

Digital technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT), and data analytics are reshaping agri-food systems and accelerating the emergence of Digital Innovation Ecosystems (DIEs): multi-actor, digitally enabled collaboration systems that connect shared data and infrastructure, governance, financing, and learning. Yet benefits are not automatic. Outcomes depend on ecosystem design and orchestration, particularly for smallholders and other underserved actors. We identify current developments in DIEs and examine how they can foster cross-learning, collaboration, inclusivity, and alignment of public–private investment to enable scalable and responsible innovation, including Ethical, Legal and Social Aspects (ELSA). These insights are derived from an international two-day workshop convening ~50 experts from research, industry, policy, and civil society, organized into six tracks. Workshop outcomes (through artefacts such as pitches, breakout notes, plenary boards) were analysed, interpreted and placed in the context of literature, synthesized via a track-by-theme matrix, and prioritized using novelty, feasibility, and expected impact. Discussions converged on seven developments: (1) infrastructure and interoperability as enabling conditions; (2) trust, governance, and farmer agency; (3) aligning investment across the ‘twilight zone’; (4) smallholder inclusion and first-mile design; (5) responsible innovation and ELSA integration; (6) AI validation and human-centric design; and (7) supply-chain ecosystem governance and standards. For each development we provide a priority-tagged research and action agenda with time horizons (near, medium, long) and primary stakeholders. The paper offers a transparent, reproducible synthesis and a practical roadmap to build inclusive, ethically grounded, and scalable DIEs, globally relevant in framing, but requiring context-specific adaptation, particularly in low- and middle-income country (LMIC) settings.