National Investment Framework for Revitalizing the R&D Collaborative Ecosystem of Sustainable Smart Agriculture

Doyeon Lee and Keunhwan Kim
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Doyeon Lee: Center for R&D Investment and Strategy Research, Division of Data Analysis, Korea Institute of Science and Technology Information, 66, Hoegi-ro, Dongdaemun-gu, Seoul 02456, Korea
Keunhwan Kim: Center for R&D Investment and Strategy Research, Division of Data Analysis, Korea Institute of Science and Technology Information, 66, Hoegi-ro, Dongdaemun-gu, Seoul 02456, Korea

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 11, 1-30

Abstract: Demographic, economic, and environmental issues, including climate change events, aging population, growing urban-rural disparity, and the COVID-19 pandemic, contribute to vulnerabilities in agricultural production and food systems. South Korea has designated smart agriculture as a national strategic investment, expanding investment in research and development (R&D) to develop and commercialize convergence technologies, thus extending sustainable smart agriculture and strengthening global competitiveness. Hence, this study probes the status of smart agricultural R&D investment from the perspectives of public funds, research areas, technologies, regions, organizations, and stakeholders. It examines 5646 public R&D projects worth USD 1408.5 million on smart agriculture in 17 regions and eight technology clusters from 2015 to 2021. Further, it proposes a pool of potential collaborative networks via a case study of strawberry, a representative veritable crop inspiring smart agriculture, to demonstrate the study framework’s usefulness in promoting smart agriculture and establishing a sustainable R&D collaboration ecosystem. The proposed framework, accordingly, allows stakeholders to understand and monitor the status of R&D investment from various perspectives. Moreover, given the insight into the tasks belonging to technical areas and regions that require sustainable cooperation in smart agriculture, central and local governments develop policies to reinforce sustainable smart-farming models.

Keywords: smart agriculture; collaboration; national R&D project; government investment; framework; ecosystem; strawberry (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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