Privacy-Preserving Data Linkage Across Private and Public Datasets for Collaborative Agriculture Research

TL;DR

This paper presents a privacy-preserving framework for secure data linkage across private and public datasets in digital agriculture, enabling analysis without compromising sensitive information.

Contribution

It introduces a novel algorithm that securely links agricultural datasets, facilitating research and policy-making while safeguarding privacy.

Findings

Effective data linkage demonstrated on real-world datasets

Machine learning models trained on privacy-preserved data show promising results

Framework supports policy analysis for food insecurity and pricing issues

Abstract

Digital agriculture leverages technology to enhance crop yield, disease resilience, and soil health, playing a critical role in agricultural research. However, it raises privacy concerns such as adverse pricing, price discrimination, higher insurance costs, and manipulation of resources, deterring farm operators from sharing data due to potential misuse. This study introduces a privacy-preserving framework that addresses these risks while allowing secure data sharing for digital agriculture. Our framework enables comprehensive data analysis while protecting privacy. It allows stakeholders to harness research-driven policies that link public and private datasets. The proposed algorithm achieves this by: (1) identifying similar farmers based on private datasets, (2) providing aggregate information like time and location, (3) determining trends in price and product availability, and (4) correlating trends with public policy data, such as food insecurity statistics. We validate the framework with real-world Farmer's Market datasets, demonstrating its efficacy through machine learning models trained on linked privacy-preserved data. The results support policymakers and researchers in addressing food insecurity and pricing issues. This work significantly contributes to digital agriculture by providing a secure method for integrating and analyzing data, driving advancements in agricultural technology and development.