Indicators of digital development of small businesses in agriculture in Volgograd region

The successful adaptation of the regional agro-industrial complex to a new technological order is impossible without activating the maximum number of resources available to national agriculture: management, production, economic, financial, technological, demographic, and climatic, as well as any other factors that stimulate the transition of the agricultural sector of the Russian economy to a qualitatively new level of scientific and technological development. The fourth technological order in agriculture will become the basis for a qualitatively different level of automation and digitalization of agro-industrial production, within which the role of the business entity will be largely limited only to making key managerial, production, and economic decisions. Technological processes will be fully automated through the widespread use of robotics, digital twins, predictive and cognitive technologies, EFR and CRM systems, the Internet of Things, etc. The need to optimize these solutions and integrate them into a single production and digital network will stimulate the creation of so-called digital ecosystems in the agricultural economy. These ecosystems are “a set of technological platforms, applied Internet services, analytical, and information systems created on the basis of a computer network infrastructure with the characteristics of self-regulation, adaptability, and sustainability for the purpose of joint production or promotion of a given benefit, information exchange, and evolutionary development of the system” aimed at satisfying people’s needs for high-quality and safe food products based on the use of resource- saving and environmentally friendly technologies. The article examines the most significant indicators of the digital development of small agricultural businesses in the context of their ability to function within the framework of regional digital business ecosystems, as well as the prospects for the integration of small businesses into global ecosystems of the digital economy. A set of statistical data was studied that gives an idea of the use of digital technologies in the agricultural sector of the regional economy. A set of statistical data on the use of digital technologies in the agricultural sector of the regional economy has been studied, some indicators of the level of digitalization of small agribusiness entities have been identified and analyzed, making it possible to determine the trajectory of the digital development of micro-farm enterprises and to develop the general contours of a forecast scenario for the integration of small agricultural forms into the digital business ecosystem of the agricultural economy.