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Sharing big data for sustainable agri-food innovation

Nature Biotechnology (2026)Cite this article

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Agriculture and the food supply chain are crucial for global food security and economic growth. Yet, as the global population expands, challenges such as soil degradation, water shortages, biodiversity loss and greenhouse gas emissions threaten the long-term viability of farming and food production. Conversely, agri-food systems themselves contribute to transgression of the planetary boundaries — for example, through emissions of greenhouse gases and overuse of nitrogen and phosphorus fertilizers. Mitigating the negative environmental effects imposed by agri-food systems demands a much better understanding and management of the ecosystems and value chains on which our food production depends. Such a development in farming and food production requires extensive use and understanding of agri-food big data.

There is a tremendous increase in data generation in agricultural systems. When used effectively, these data can drive innovation and enhance the efficiency and sustainability of agricultural production, processing and consumption1. Despite this, data handling and sharing practices are inadequate, with a lack of common standards and data remaining fragmented across various actors. In this Correspondence, we outline why sharing of big data is a vital driver of innovation in the agri-food sector. We discuss the main challenges and propose steps to enhance data sharing and exploration from a research funder’s perspective.

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Fig. 1: Data and stakeholders across the farm-to-fork value chain.

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Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Erik Alexandersson, Thies Marten Heick.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Novo Nordisk Foundation, Hellerup, Denmark

    Erik Alexandersson, Thies Marten Heick, Anna Chailyan, Sisse Marquina-Jongberg, Thomas de Bang & Claus Felby

Authors
  1. Erik Alexandersson
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  2. Thies Marten Heick
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  3. Anna Chailyan
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  4. Sisse Marquina-Jongberg
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  5. Thomas de Bang
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  6. Claus Felby
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Contributions

All authors conceived the study. E.A. and T.H. drafted the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final version of the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Erik Alexandersson.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Alexandersson, E., Heick, T.M., Chailyan, A. et al. Sharing big data for sustainable agri-food innovation. Nat Biotechnol (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41587-026-03052-0

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