Agricultural Extensions Efficacy in Advancing Rural Development:

1

• Agricultural Extensions Efficacy in Advancing
  Rural Development
• A perennial search for the approach
• IARD 402 class
• October 6, 2006
• Terry W. Tucker
• Cornell University

2
Agricultural ExtensionGood Intentions, Major
Public Investment, Variable Impact

• Historically, the dominant objective for
  extension has been to promote agricultural
  development through information and technology
  transfer (assumed that this non-formal education
  for farmers would improve rural welfare).
• Scope of the public investment nearly one
  million extension personnel worldwide (90 in
  developing countries) 10 Billion in donor
  assistance for extension in past 50 years.

3
Two stories of agricultural development since
1960 Dramatic productivity gains in favored
areas Persistent rural poverty and declining
productivity in marginal areas
Public extension bears some responsibility for
both
4
Public extension has been trying to get it
right for 50 years, experimenting with various
approaches, methodologies, messages and
institutional arrangements
5
Characterizing major approaches to agricultural
research and extension

• Conventional transfer of technology (TOT)

research

• One way information flow
• Top down
• Typically the responsibility
• of large, hierarchical public
• bureaucracies
• Research and extension
• often poorly linked

extension
farmers
6
Where is research conducted?
7
Who sets the research agenda?
Upland rice research trials conducted by
Philippine Rice Research Institute
8
Other Characteristics of TOT
9
Advantages of TOT

• Nationwide extension coverage to support
  initiatives that
• reflect national priorities
• Targeting scarce public resources on high
  potential producers
• (larger, more commercially-oriented) has often
  raised aggregate
• production.

10
Disadvantages of TOT

• Relatively little attention to small,
  marginalized, semi-subsistence farmers (biased
• in favor of literate, landowners, male,
  commercially-oriented)
• Station-generated technology often lacks fit,
  especially for farmers
• in less favored areas
• Bureaucratic (accountability upward to ministry
  rather than downward to farmers)
• Equity and environmental sustainability are
  distant secondary concerns (at best)

11
Market-oriented farmers have extension
information options
12
They increasingly choose the fee-based extension
services of cooperatives, commodity associations,
private consultants and agribusiness input dealers
13
What about extension for the most
resource-limited farmer?
14
source FAO
15
Training and Visit Extension (TV)
16
(No Transcript)
17
Original Rationale for T V

• NEED FOR
• Extensionists to get out of offices into
  villages
• Increased density of extension
• Regular training for extensionists and farmers
• Increased accountability

18
Criticisms of T V

• Focus on favored environments
• and groups
• Standard replication approach to
• technology leads to fit problems
• except in very homogeneous
• environments
• Little attention to farmer capacity
• for innovation (remains expert-driven)
• High cost (unsustainable without
• large World Bank loans to
• governments)

19
Farming Systems Research seeking to address
biophysical and socioeconomic heterogeneity
through on- farm research led by
interdisciplinary teams of scientists
20
What are an agronomist and an anthropologist
doing on the same FSR team?
21
Farming Systems Research

• More holistic research
• On farm research (technology generated fits
  local conditions)
• Dissemination often either overlooked (no
  connection with
• extension) or scientist-centered
• Farmer participation ??

22
Participation of farmers in research features of
four types
Adapted from M.Biggs
23
Where is extension headed next? Will it be
reinvented in the next decade? Clearly, there
can be no one size fits all approach or
institutional framework.
24

• Many small and medium-sized farmers in developing
  countries are not resource-poor. Moreover,
  their productivity is important to an
  increasingly urbanized populations food
  security. How do the knowledge needs of these
  farmers differ from those of the poor? What does
  this imply for agricultural research and
  extension?

25
Food industry value chain developments What
are the implications for farmers and their
knowledge and information needs?

• More vertical alignment (vs. open access market
  relationship between producers, buyers and
  suppliers)
• Higher industry benchmarks for efficiency through
  better flow scheduling and resource utilization
• Higher consumer expectations for quality control
  and food safety
• Faster industry response time to changes in
  consumer demand
• 
  (Boehlje, M. 2005)

26

• A supply chain approach to the value chain
  coordination increases the interdependence
  between the various stages in the
  production/processing/distribution chain it
  encourages strategic alliances, networks,
  vertical integration and other linkages to
  improve logistics, product flow and information
  flow. In the future, competition likely will
  increasingly occur in the form of alternative
  supply chain (rather than individual firms)
  competing for their share of the consumers food
  dollar expenditure.
• 
  (Boehlje, M., 2005)
• What value chain alliance will leave the
  matter of knowledge resources/information
  services for farmers to chance? Market demands
  will drive increased privatization of knowledge
  services for commercial producers.

27
Innovation Systems
28
Both public and private organizations are rapidly
expanding comprehensive agricultural centers
offering a range of fee-based services.Demand-d
riven, farmer responsive services for farmers who
can pay
Centralized government-run extension services
will see increased pressure to improve
performance with fewer public resources. Some
will disappear. Most will lose any dominance
they might now have as an information source.
29
(No Transcript)
30
What about the small farmer?

• Is there room for commercially-oriented small
  farmers in these increasingly sophisticated value
  chain networks/alliances? Can small farmers make
  the investments necessary to meet higher quality
  standards? Can they operate in the world of
  formal contracts?
• What might knowledge services look like for
  commercially-oriented farmers that lack the scale
  and resources to participate in the large
  alliances?
• What alternatives for improved economic viability
  exist for truly resource-poor small farmers?
  (more local value addition? Niche products or
  markets? Off-farm employment?)

31

• Selected Discussion Questions
• What approach to knowledge generation and
  dissemination holds most promise for rural
  development?
• What should be the primary goal of extension
  for the resource-poor? Poverty alleviation?
  Food security? Empowerment? Alternative
  livelihood development?
• How can markets work for resource-poor farmers?
• Can public-private partnerships more effectively
  serve the knowledge needs of farmers?

32
(No Transcript)