Artificial Intelligence and Food Sovereignty: The Limits of the Food and Agriculture Organization’s International Mandate in Governing Agricultural Technology

Abstract

The agricultural sector is undergoing a profound technological transformation as artificial intelligence increasingly becomes integrated into the processes through which food is produced, managed, distributed, and consumed. Technologies based on machine learning, predictive analytics, satellite imagery, remote sensing, automated machinery, agricultural robotics, and intelligent decision-support systems are progressively changing conventional methods of agricultural management. Artificial intelligence can analyse extensive quantities of information concerning soil conditions, weather patterns, crop development, water availability, pests, diseases, market conditions, and agricultural productivity, allowing farmers, enterprises, and public authorities to make decisions based on increasingly sophisticated digital information. This transformation has created new opportunities for improving agricultural productivity and responding to climate change and resource scarcity, but it has simultaneously introduced new legal, economic, institutional, and sovereignty-related challenges.

The increasing digitalisation of agriculture is particularly significant because contemporary food systems are becoming increasingly dependent not only on land, water, seeds, machinery, and human labour, but also on data and technological infrastructure. Agricultural data constitute an increasingly valuable resource because they can reveal information concerning soil characteristics, production levels, crop patterns, irrigation requirements, land use, market behaviour, and the activities of farmers. When such information is processed through artificial intelligence systems, it can generate predictions and recommendations capable of influencing agricultural decision-making. Consequently, control over agricultural data and the technologies used to process them may become an important component of economic and strategic power within contemporary food systems.