A stealthy revolution is taking place across African food systems. Not in the soil or on the farm, but in computers, platforms, and satellite systems that we do not own or manage. From AI-powered agricultural apps to blockchain-based supply networks, digital technologies are fast changing the way we raise, sell, and consume food. While this transition is frequently portrayed as "progress," we must ask: ‘progress for whom?’.

Across the continent, digital agriculture is being implemented with dazzling promises—higher yields, better market access, and more climate resilience. But beneath the smooth veneer is a worrisome trend: ‘digital colonisation of African agriculture’.

Foreign donors, technology companies, and development agencies promote tools and platforms that rarely represent the realities of African farmers. Instead, they integrate a logic of extraction, converting data into profit, farmers into users, and communities into test sites. Local wisdom is overlooked. Agroecology is overlooked. Again, decision-making authority is concentrated in the hands of organisations located far from the land.

Digitalisation is not the same as democratisation. The ability to collect data is not synonymous with empowering farmers. High-tech solutions cannot replace political will, farmer sovereignty, or environmental sustainability.

If we allow digital agriculture to take the same top-down, corporate-led approach as the Green Revolution, we risk making the same mistakes—this time with code.

It does not have to be this way.

Throughout Africa, communities are innovating on their terms. Grassroots organisations are reclaiming the digital sphere, with seed-saving networks and mobile agroecological teaching tools. However, they are underfunded, underappreciated, and frequently excluded from national and continental technology debates.

That must change.

What we need now is a concerted effort to build capacity from below, allowing African farmers, youth, researchers, and civil society actors to critically evaluate, adapt, and influence the technologies being introduced into local food systems.

To create open-source, community-led tools that serve people rather than platforms, it's important to distinguish between liberating and exploitative technology. Centre agroecology, not as an "add-on" but as a paradigm for digital justice and food sovereignty.
And demand that African governments stop rubber-stamping technology agendas set by external parties.

Digital technologies aren't neutral. They represent ideals, philosophies, and interests. If we are not at the table shaping them, we will undoubtedly appear on the menu.

This is a defining moment. Either Africa will remain a laboratory for corporate experimentation—or we will choose our own path. Let us choose sovereignty. Let us choose justice. Let us choose a food future that is not only intelligent, but also grounded, equitable, and free.

A potential example of integrating digital tools in a co-created, locally grounded approach is the recent launch of an 'agroecology e-learning course' jointly developed by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA). This collaborative endeavour, launched during the East African Agroecology Conference in Nairobi, illustrates the continent's rising acknowledgement of agroecology. While the conference should have addressed the social movement side of agroecology, it did demonstrate how digital platforms can be utilised to amplify agroecological knowledge, promote farmer-led innovation, and develop alternative food system narratives. It's a tiny but significant step towards a future in which digital technologies benefit the public good, and African actors co-author the tools that shape local food systems.