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

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Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2014 07:25:16 +0100
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This is from Mahesh Chander, again, on the topic of capacities of extension service providers.

Farmers in developing countries are increasingly expecting and requesting from rural advisory services a much broader range of services than before. For instance, farmers need information on certified agriculture/organic agriculture, good agricultural practices, traceability tools, climate smart agricultural practices, requirements for exporting agricultural products, organic standards and certification procedures, agro/rural tourism, exploring remunerative markets for their designer/innovative products etc. 

The agricultural extension professionals in developing countries are often found deficient in their capacities to cater to these emerging needs of farmers especially in poor developing countries. Here arises the question of capacity building of extension professionals. The institutions which typically train extensionists are also at times not equipped with the human resource which can help on these new requirements. The training institutions have to take note of these emerging requirements of farmers as well as the trainers who need new capacities to meet out the new challenges.  

The regional, national extension networks have to take a lead in orienting and building capacities of extension personnel.We have to accept the fact that the conventional way of doing farming is not helping much and farmers need to diversify their income sources including changing their practices to keep pace with the modernizing world where consumers too want to taste a diversity of food products for which their is a willingness to pay too. The farmer need to change so extensionists too need to change by improving their capacities in these new areas of agrifood production. For instance, the small scale producers can do better collectively in organic agriculture by forming organic producer groups, but they need information and support in skilling and linking with market for organic products. Organic agriculture is highly knowledge intensive system and also the markets need to be developed/explored for niche products like Organic. If we think, a small scale producer will convert to organic on his own simply by receiving some information on organic farming, it would be a fallacy and misbelief. Such farmers need a whole range of support including bio-inputs, production/processing standards, certification procedures and linking with market for organic products.

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
 
[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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