Smart agri-food supply chains during the 2020s: Mapping emerging trends, prevailing themes, and future directions

• Smart agri-food supply chains exhibit an evolving positive trend in current decade. • Regional smart agri-food supply chains exhibit increasing significance. • Blockchain technology plays a pivotal role in smart agri-food supply chains. • Sustainable adoption of digital technologies in agri-food supply chains is imperative. In recent years, the integration of digital technologies to optimize Agri-Food Supply Chain (A-FSC) management has received significant attention. This study aimed to comprehensively review the literature surrounding Smart Agri-Food Supply Chains (SA-FSCs) and explore the prevailing themes, emerging trends, and foundational and influential themes. A bibliometric analysis utilizing keyword co-occurrence (co-word) and co-citation networking was employed to analyze the data. The documents extracted from the Scopus database were screened through the PRISMA protocol, and 3334 articles published between 2020–2024 were included in the analysis. Bibliometric analysis identified the most influential authors, countries, journals, references, and annual growth trends, as well as international participation, and revealed an evolving positive trend in SA-FSCs during the current decade. Co-word analysis revealed that emerging trends in SA-FSCs can be summarized around five axes: “food safety and food waste,” “A-FSC management and traceability,” “Sustainable development in A-FSCs,” “Digital technologies in A-FSCs,” and “Innovation and technology adoption in A-FSCs”. Co-citation analysis, supplemented by a detailed content analysis of key articles, clustered foundational and influential SA-FSC themes into four axes and highlighted the central role of traceability, particularly blockchain technology, among other digital technologies of SA-FSCs. Finally, based on the findings of this study regarding prevailing themes and foundational and influential themes, a structured and concise research agenda was formulated to guide and enhance future studies on SA-FSCs. These findings provide critical insights for researchers and policymakers to identify and target the most pressing needs within the SA-FSC domain.