The Institute of Law is one of four BOKU institutes to take part in the research cluster Digitalisation in Agriculture. Over the course of three years, a total of 23 project partners will be joining their efforts to explore the framework and opportunities of digitalisation in agriculture from a primarily application-oriented perspective. The project is funded by the Austrian Rural Development Programme 2014-2020. The Institute of Law is mainly involved in the sub-project Legal Framework for Digitalisation, covering questions of data protection law, data ownership and data sovereignty.

Abstract

Digitalisation and data management play a crucial role in modern agriculture. State-of-the-art machines and devices generate, process and exchange a huge amount of data with the goal of increasing efficiency. However, these new technologies also lead to concerns among stakeholders about data protection. The sub-project Legal Framework for Digitalisation addresses this conflict area.
In dialogue with agricultural experts, open questions about data flows, data processing and data use are collected and systematized. Select projects from Innovation Farms provide an illustrative record of the data path and allow for a comprehensible overview. This sets the basis for an analysis from a data (protection) law perspective: To what extent is personal data affected? How are roles in data protection law distributed? What do individual rights – such as the right to information, the right to delete or transfer data – exactly entail for those affected by data collection?

The project’s findings will be prepared and made available in the form of publications, guidelines and other documentation, as well as in the form of lectures, workshops and practical modules.

Team:

Dr. Claudia Fuchs, LL.M. (EUR), BOKU project leader
Mag. Florian Graber, research associate
Dipl.-Ing. Ferdinand Hönigsberger, B.Sc., research associate

Partners:

Josephinum Research (lead)
HBLFA Francisco Josephinum Wieselburg

The Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety (AGES)

Bildungswerkstatt Mold

Raumberg- Gumpenstein Reasearch & Development
HBLFA Raumberg-Gumpenstein

Landwirtschaftskammer Österreich
Landwirtschaftskammer Oberösterreich
Landwirtschaftskammer Tirol
Landwirtschaftskammer Wien
Landwirtschaftskammer Kärnten
Landwirtschaftskammer Niederösterreich
Landwirtschaftskammer Salzburg
Landwirtschaftskammer Steiermark
Landwirtschaftskammer Vorarlberg
Landwirtschaftskammer Burgenland

Ländliches Fortbildungsinstitut Österreich
Ländliches Fortbildungsinstitut Niederösterreich
Ländliches Fortbildungsinstitut Steiermark

Umweltbundesamt (UBA)

University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna (BOKU)

Association of Austrian Cattle Breeders (ZAR)

ZuchtData Dienstleistungen GmbH