Centering and Engaging Farmers in Technology Development to Facilitate Innovation Adoption: Designing Your Approach

Researchers, engineers, scientists, and program designers can use the information from this publication to engage better with farmers and to ensure programs and products from research are beneficial and easily adopted. This publication shares background on the importance of engagement and several high-level strategies for consideration as you approach engagement, especially for the first time, illustrated by the work of the IoT4Ag Center. Overall, the strategies center the farmer, addressing how to design engagement around audience needs, understand externalities, and determine shared values, highlighted by a case study of how engagement has gone wrong. Written by Shiala M. Naranjo and Kathryn A. Stofer, and published by the UF/IFAS Department of Agricultural Education and Communication, September 2025.