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Moderated conference on rural advisory services for family farms: 1-18 December 2014

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"Moderated conference on rural advisory services for family farms: 1-18 December 2014" <[log in to unmask]>
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I am Dr Muhammad Anjum Ali, Director General Agriculture Extension, Punjab, Pakistan, working in the agriculture extension wing for the last 20 years. 



I am following this discussion regularly and found it very useful to extract valuable information to finalize policy for family farms. 



Pakistan agriculture is governed by family farms as more than 8 million farms are present with over 95% of farms less than 10 hectares. In addition, 67% of the population of 184 million people is living in rural areas. Pakistan is also divided in 10 different agro ecological regions based on rainfall, temperature and soil. Every region has a dominant cropping pattern but wheat is dominant is all regions followed by cotton, rice, sugarcane, maize, pulses, fruits and vegetables. Since the vision of Pakistan agriculture is productivity enhancement, diversification, intensification and value addition without harming soil, water and environment, therefore, facing challenges to improve soil health, improve water availability and healthy environment beside availability of agriculture inputs of standard quality especially of seed. In spite of all these, Pakistan agriculture has also delivered to feed the burgeoning population and is a food surplus country. However, now family farming without any cohesion is creating a trouble in adoption of technologies and there is a big gap between the yield of progressive and average farms. Family setup at the farms has also less support of agriculture credit and scale specific technologies to bridge these gaps. 



Various agriculture extension tools like the Training and Visit (T&V) system, Reformed T&V, Hub Farmers Approach, Farmers Field School, Plant Clinics and heavy reliance of ICT tools are being used to increase the reach of the extension service, and every new intervention proposed after the culmination of this discussion to create maximum spread to the small family farms will be appreciated. 



It is also apt to mention that lady farm workers are dominant in Pakistan agriculture being the integral part of the family. Moreover, each family farm has major, minor crops and livestock to maintain their livelihoods. Therefore, cooperative farming, farmers organization, village organization, one village one product for exact technology, water productivity and market connectivity, village adoption program through the experts, philanthropist, provision of seed money to run village societies like interpolations can be tested to upgrade the socio-economic conditions of the family farms with specific, refined, quick and crisp message according to their needs fortified with all ancillaries mandatory for farming. 



Dr Muhammad Anjum Ali

Director General Agriculture

(Extension and Adaptive Research) 

Agriculture House 

21 Davis Road 

Lahore,

Punjab, 

Pakistan.

00924299200732/ 

e-mail: dgaextar (at) gmail.com    



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