Role of clusters in development of the digital ecosystem of the agro-industrial complex

Abstract

The main trends in agriculture over the past few years have been export orientation and digitalization. Since 2019, the departmental project "Digital Agriculture" has been implemented. In 2021, a draft order of the government of the Russian Federation "On the Strategic Direction in the Field of Digital Transformation of the Agro-Industrial and Fishery Complex of the Russian Federation until 2030" was developed, which provides for development of a national online platform for promoting the agricultural products and the launch of a modeling and forecasting system for the agro-industrial complex. Currently, the beneficiaries of digitalization are large agricultural holdings and the IT industry (manufacturers of sensors and software developers for machinery and equipment, software companies, fertilizer producers and telecom operators). In order for small and medium-sized farms that do not have sufficient resources for end-to-end digitalization of production and business processes to be able to join the innovation race, it is necessary to look for a format of interaction in which competition and cooperation are organically combined. The article discusses one of such forms of association – clusters; explores their potential role in development of platform network architectures; the similarities and differences of cluster and digital industrial systems are analyzed. It is concluded that the flexibility and openness of cluster structures allows actors to find their functional areas and niches and organically fit into the created digital ecosystem of the agro-industrial complex.