Ethics, Governance, and Team Roles

This unit explores the ethical, legal, and social implications of applying AI and GIS in agricultural and natural resource contexts, including bias, privacy, safety, and economic impact. Students will learn governance approaches, risk mitigation strategies, and collaborative roles and communication practices required to deploy AI responsibly and set stakeholder expectations.

Learning Objectives

• Analyze how AI models and GIS data pipelines can amplify discrimination and social biases in agricultural contexts and recommend mitigation strategies
• Apply data protection, privacy, and safety best practices to geospatial datasets and AI workflows, including anonymization, access controls, and secure data handling
• Evaluate governance frameworks, regulatory considerations, and the trade-offs between innovation and regulation when deploying AI solutions for agriculture
• Demonstrate effective roles, responsibilities, and communication strategies within multidisciplinary AI teams and use stakeholder-centered conversations to set realistic expectations about AI capabilities and limitations