Agricultural extension plays a crucial role in boosting agricultural productivity, increasing food security,

improving rural livelihoods, and promoting agricultural as an engine of pro-poor economic growth.
Extension provides a critical support service for rural producers meeting the new challenges confronting
agriculture: transformation in the global food and agricultural system, including the rise of
supermarkets and the growing importance of standards, labels, and food safety; growth in nonfarm
rural employment and agribusiness; and the deterioration of the natural resource base and climate
change.

Given the importance of agriculture and the need to produce food both for the farm family and for the
nation as a whole, this emphasis upon agricultural extension is understandable. An agricultural
extension offers technical advice on agriculture to farmers, and also supplies them with the necessary
inputs and services to support their agricultural production. It provides information to farmers and
passes to the farmers new ideas developed by agricultural research stations. Agricultural extension had
offered programs to the countryside farmers that cover a broad area including improved crop varieties,
better livestock control, improved water management, and the control of weeds, pests or plant
diseases. Where appropriate, agricultural extension also help build up local farmers' groups and
organizations so that they can benefit from these extension programs. Agricultural extension, therefore,
provides the indispensable elements that farmers need to improve their agricultural productivity.