Systematic Literature Review of Barriers and Enablers to Implementing Food Informatics Technologies: Unlocking...

Access to food products is becoming more and more complex due to population growth, climate change, political and economic instability, disruptions in the global value chain, as well as changes in consumption dynamics and food insecurity. Therefore, agri-food chains face increasingly greater challenges in responding to these dynamics, where the digitalization of agri-food systems has become an innovative alternative. However, efforts to adopt and use the technologies of the fourth industrial revolution (precision agriculture, smart agriculture, the Industrial Internet of Things, and the Internet of Food, among others) are still a challenge to improve efficiency in the links of production (cultivation), processing (food production), and final consumption, from the perspective of the implementation of Food Informatics technologies that improve traceability, authenticity, consumer confidence, and reduce fraud. This systematic literature review proposes the identification of barriers and enablers for the implementation of Food Informatics technologies in the links of the agri-food chain. The PRISMA methodology was implemented for the identification, screening, eligibility, and inclusion of articles from the Scopus and Clarivate databases. A total of 206 records were included in the in-depth analysis, through which a total of 34 barriers to the adoption of Food Informatics technologies (13 for the production link, 12 for the processing link, and 9 for the marketing link) and a total of 27 enablers (8 for the production link, 11 for the processing link, and 8 for the marketing link) were identified. Among the barriers analogous to the three links analyzed are privacy and information security and high investment and maintenance costs, while the analogous enablers are mainly government support.