Thank you to the hosts and moderators of this important discussion, and for all the great coments so far! Several excellent points have already been made, which I'll try to add to and not repeat here.

In terms of the what roles ICTs can play for family farmers in using Open Data, I think the list is potentially quite long and perhaps limitless. Especially if one looks at the farm as serving many purposes, or being "multifunctional". That includes supporting not only informed decision making related to farm productivity, market access and economic viability, but a variety of things often overlooked from a technical perspective, like family health and resilience, and self-determination.

For a variety of reasons many "experts" including academics and consultants are often focused on using ICTs for a particular set of farm outcomes, sometimes blind to or at the expense of others which may be equally important to the long term well-being of the farm and the families which depend on them.

My Cornell colleague Rebecca Nelson has suggested that instead of using ICTs to "optimize for simplicity", focused on disseminating top-down (often proprietary) one-size-fits-all solutions for problems and opportunities that are in fact extremely diverse, we instead leverage them in support of solutions which are "optimized for complexity". This ultimately means helping farmers assess and experiment with what the best options are for their particular context, at the individual farm level and through collectives like "Farmer Research Networks" (FRN). I had the privilege of visiting one such effort in Australia last spring, the Birchip Cropping Group.

This shifts the focus (and perhaps the original question of this forum) away from farmers as users or "consumers" of Open Data, toward helping them become active participants in the creation, exchange and transformation of it within larger systems, or "value networks". Modern ICTs and the Open Data Ecosystems which initiatives like GODAN are promoting are perfectly suited to support this shift.

But getting from here to there will require new "sociotechnical capabilities" which acknowledge and develop technical as well as social capabilities needed for equitable and effective participation within such data ecosystems, open or otherwise. That includes greater attention to and investment in the role Open Data Intermediaries and related entities like FRNs play within these ecosystems.

Here in the U.S. I've been advocating that our own Land Grant and Cooperative Extension systems pay closer attention to the role of ICTs and Open Data/Information Ecosystems, and how we might leverage them in support of healthier people, communities and food systems.