Food security, climate change and sustainability are increasingly shaping individual consumption (shaping consumption and business) choices and becoming important themes at a policy and social level. As a result, the Agrifood field is attracting more entrepreneurs and technology experts, as the philosophy of the agriculture is undergoing a fundamental transformation based on the digitalization and use of new technologies.
Multifunctionality originates in the supposition that agriculture, apart from the production of food also has other broader social functions and aspects, such as maintaining production potentials encouraging rural development (keeping the population in the country, cultivating the landscape), and protecting the environment. this approach emphasizes that the relationship between agricultural holdings and their local communities can to be symbiotic. From this perspective, multifunctionality is considered a “proactive development tool for promoting a more sustainable economy, including synergies”, whose activities should “create opportunities for additional income and employment in agriculture”.
It is important to point out that the development of multifunctionality at the level of agricultural unit can improve the prospects for its survival, which in turn can increase the opportunities for economic diversification in the local community, contributing to the creation of a new agricultural sector that meets the needs and expectations of wider society and to radically redefine and reshape rural resources, on and beyond the agricultural economy.
Many new technologies with the potential to redesign agrifood and agriculture practices are emerging, and higher education, vocational education and training will have a key role to prepare future generations to handle all the challenges that are yet to come and raise attractiveness to a sector that still suffers from a lack of generational turnover.