This is Dr Mahesh Chander again, responding to Question 4.1 in the background document.
The discussion has rightly chosen to ignore large family farms which, being mostly large business ventures, are capable of accessing information and other services on their own, and also public extension services are mostly irrelevant to them. The small or medium-sized family farms being in transition to market-oriented and commercialization seek extension services from wherever they can get them, thus manage getting extension services from public agencies and NGOs. Also, they are capable of using modern ICT tools like mobile phones etc.
The real challenge is to cater to the needs of subsistence or near-subsistence smallholders who don’t seek extension services on their own but extension services have to reach their doorsteps. This is the group which needs maximum attention considering their weak access to sources of information, low risk-taking ability, low affordability etc. But ironically the group which needs extension services (especially from government sources) most is ignored in many extension programmes. We have seen extension personnel feel comfortable to work with the small or medium-sized family farms. The public extension services find it difficult to meet the demands of large farms which are in a higher level, while they don’t find it lucrative to cater to subsistence farms because it requires a certain level of dedication, commitment to work with very poor farmers and the chances of failure in terms of low adoption of recommendations are high. The efforts and resources, thus, should be focused more on this category of farm families.
The personal contact of extension agents may not be important to the first and second category of farm families, so the extension strategy should consider personal contact methods to exclusively serve this category of farm families. Secondly, Village Resource Centres/Village Knowledge Centers (VKCs) equipped with ICT-enabled services could be useful to them, provided the limitations with these VKCs are overcome to facilitate subsistence farmers to make good use of them. Community Radio can also be used to ensure their participation in developmental interventions. The strategies may differ for different categories of farmers in different geographical regions, but personal contact is very much essential for subsistence farmers anywhere.
Dr Mahesh Chander
Head
Division of Extension Education
Indian Veterinary research Institute,
Izatnagar (UP)
India
Phone +91 581 2302391, Fax: +91 581 2303284
Email: Mahesh64 (at) email.com
References:
- Senthilkumar,S; Mahesh Chander; A. Serma Saravana Pandian & N.K. Sudeep Kumar.2013. Factors associated with utilization of ICT enabled Village Information Centres by the dairy farmers in India: The case of Tamil Nadu. Computers and Electronics in Agriculture, 98:81-84.
- Senthilkumar, S. and Mahesh Chander. 2011. Perceived Information Needs of Dairy Farmers in Accessing ICT-Enabled Village Information Centres. Journal of Dairying, Foods and Home Sciences, 2011, 30 (4): 239 -241.
- Senthil Kumar, S. & Mahesh Chander.2009. Effectiveness of ICT enabled village information centres in improving knowledge level of dairy farmers in Tamil Nadu. Indian Journal of Dairy Science (Nov-Dec), 62, 6,442-446.
- Senthil Kumar, S. & Mahesh Chander.2009. Constraints perceived by dairy farmers in accessing ICT enabled village Information centres. Indian Jr. Anim. Res., 43 (4): 282-284.
[Question 4.1 from the conference background document was:
"What are the unique characteristics or features of rural advisory services for different types of family farms?
As described above, three broad categories of family farms can be described i.e.
- large family farms which are essentially large business ventures;
- small or medium-sized family farms which are, or may become, market-oriented and commercial;
- subsistence or near-subsistence smallholders.
Given that the focus of this e-mail conference is on the second and third categories of family farms, what are the unique characteristics or features of rural advisory services for each of these two categories of family farms? Also, how do the characteristics differ between the two categories? Furthermore, how do they differ from the characteristics of rural advisory services needed by family farms in the first category?"...Moderator].
[To contribute to this conference, send your message to [log in to unmask] For further information, see http://www.fao.org/nr/research-extension-systems/res-home/news/detail/en/c/264776/
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