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and Extension
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Public Sector Agricultural Extension

System Reform and the Challenges
Ahead
a
William M. Rivera
a
College of Agriculture and Natural Resources , University of
Maryland , USA
Published online: 29 Apr 2011.

To cite this article: William M. Rivera (2011) Public Sector Agricultural Extension System Reform
and the Challenges Ahead, The Journal of Agricultural Education and Extension, 17:2, 165-180, DOI:
10.1080/1389224X.2011.544457

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 Journal of Agricultural Education and Extension
Vol. 17, No. 2, 165
180, April 2011

Public Sector Agricultural Extension

System Reform and the Challenges
Ahead
WILLIAM M. RIVERA
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College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, University of Maryland, USA

ABSTRACT This paper is organized into two main sections. The first section examines extension
as an engine for innovation and reviews the numerous priorities confronting extension systems.
Section two highlights the current knowledge imperative and the critical connection of extension to
post-secondary higher education and training, organizational inservice training, and vocationally
oriented self-directed learning. Final comments address ‘The Continuing Role of the Public
Sector’, and the prospect of its role in balancing societal interests and promoting extension as an
aspect of a knowledge economy. The conclusion proposes what may be agricultural extension’s
challenges ahead.

KEY WORDS: International agricultural extension, Extension reform, Innovation, Knowledge

systems

Extension’s Innovation Challenge

The challenge today for extension is not simply to transfer knowledge and
information but to foster and implement innovation where appropriate at the farm
field level. Innovations tend to be needed in the less economically developed countries
in particular throughout the extension organization, as well as at the policy level.

Engine for Innovation

Extension was originally conceived as a service to ‘extend’ research-based knowledge
to the rural sector to improve the lives of farmers. It thus includes components of
technology transfer, broader rural development goals, management skills, and non-
formal education (Mosher, 1976). This broad view of extension is nonetheless very
much focused on increasing production, improving yields, training farmers, and
transferring technology. Today’s understanding of extension includes assisting farmer
groups to form ‘economic interest organizations’ (Nkonya et al., 2008) to deal with
marketing issues and partner with other service providers and agencies. Hence,
extension becomes an organizational as well as an educational contributor to a
country’s knowledge economy.

Correspondence address: William M. Rivera, Retired, Independent Consultant, 9200 St. Andrews Place,
College Park, MD 20740, USA. Email: wr@umd.edu

1389-224X Print/1750-8622 Online/11/020165-16 # 2011 Wageningen University

DOI: 10.1080/1389224X.2011.544457
 166 W.M. Rivera

Both the ideological and e-technological developments over the past generation
have impacted extension and will continue to do so. Private-sector hegemony in
agriculture and the privatization of agricultural extension systems are unlikely to
abate. As a consequence, one challenge is to provide extension for small-poor-
subsistence farmers, to complement private sector development and assure small farmers
of food security and advancement toward linkages with value-chain markets.
The bimodal separation of large and small farming populations appears endemic
and is sometimes criticized by economists. Some economists (Johnston and Kilby,
1975; Eicher and Staatz, 1984) claim that governments should concentrate agricultur-
al development efforts on the mass of small farmers in low-income countries, rather
than promote a bimodal structure of small and large farms. This concentration on
small farmers, they argue, would lead to faster growth rates of aggregate economic
output and employment.
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Others point to pathways out of agriculture (Janvry and Sadoulet, 2001), such as
the multi-activity path, the government assistance path, and the exit path. For those
who continue in agriculture Orr and Orr, writing for the UK Overseas Development
Institute’s AgREN publication (2000), illustrate a range of farmer income sources,
from agriculture to micro-enterprise (see Figure 1).
While extension’s role is straight-forward in contract-farming arrangements and
other commercial ventures, such is not necessarily the case with public sector
extension. Its structure, organization, and operational system may differ from
country to country, even from region to region within countries. Nonetheless, a main
challenge is for extension to operate in a context where new knowledge and technology,
when appropriate, are applied. Indeed, one of the objectives in reforming public sector
extension is to make its services a better instrument, or engine to promote innovation,
whether acquired indigenously or via modern science. While extension is presently an
object of reform, it continues to be an increasingly important engine for spreading
knowledge and fostering innovation.

Balance between farm and non-farm

activities for livelihood
Increasing concentration on commercial farming

A B C Accumulative

100% FARM INCOME STRONG FARM PRODUCTION BALANCE BETWEEN

SUPPLEMENTED BY FARM & NON-FARM
NON-FARM BUSINESS

Adaptive
D E F

SMALLHOLDER MIXTURE OF SMALL SCALE MAIN BUSINESS

AGRICULTURE AGRICULTURE SUPPLEMENTED BY
With no or little AGRICULTURAL
business Coping PRODUCTION

Survival
G H I

NO OR LITTLE LAND, VIABLE-STABLE 100% INCOME FROM

OR INCOME GENERATION NON-FARM BUSINESS BUSINESS

Income-generating activities Viable Stable Growth

Increasing concentration on business and diversification

Figure 1. The relationship between agriculture and micro-enterprise.

Source: Orr and Orr (2002).
 Public Sector Agricultural Extension System Reform 167

AKIS and AIS. Agricultural extension is not a simple system; it is an integral

component of several larger systems and conceptual frameworks, which render it
complex. Extension operates as part of several frameworks aimed at enabling
agriculture. The AKIS (agricultural knowledge and information system) framework
and the more recently designed AIS (agricultural innovation system) framework both
conceive extension as a tool linking multiple players in the development process.
The AIS agricultural innovation system presumes a network of organizations,
enterprises, and individuals focused on bringing new products, new processes, and
new forms of organization into social and economic use, together with the
institutions and policies that affect their behaviour and performance (World Bank,
2006; Rajalahti et al., 2008: 3). The AIS concept provides a useful approach for
mapping institutional and systemic as well as technical, agronomic and veterinarian
innovations (Pehu, 2004). A valuable study of strategic alliances required to support
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research provider organizations and to strengthen national technological innovations

systems was carried out in Nicaragua (López, 2004). According to Rajalahti, Janssen
and Pehu (2008: ix), ‘AIS is a response to the increased speed at which the farming
and rural community must move to remain competitive/productive in a rapidly
changing world’.
In the 1990s, discussion on the AKIS Agricultural Knowledge and Information
Systems brought into focus the importance of a wider set of information sources
and the value of creating systems that assist in the generation and dissemination of
knowledge (Röling, 1994). AKIS highlighted the need for strengthening the capacity
of the different systems (mainly, research, extension and education) and the linkage
mechanisms among these systems.
As second generation problems of promoting technologies (pest resurgence,
unsustainable land management) become more evident, the importance of group
action and therefore the need for platforms for interaction to promote innovation
began to be increasingly recognized. Innovation began to be described as the emergent
property of interaction among stakeholders in a natural resource or ecosystem services
(Röling and Wagemakers, 1998) The concept of innovation was broadened further to
include the outcomes of interaction among the diverse actors relevant for addressing a
particular problem. In this scenario, the role of extension was seen as facilitating the
process of reflective action, learning and decision making.
The attraction of the AIS agricultural innovation systems concept which has been
applied to agriculture is that it recognizes innovation is not just a research-driven
process simply relying on technology transfer (Hall et al., 2001; World Bank, 2006).
Instead innovation is seen as a process of generating, accessing and putting
knowledge into use. Central to the process are the interactions of different people
and their ideas; the institutions (the attitudes, habits, practices and ways of working)
that shape how individuals and organizations interact; and learning as a means of
evolving new arrangements specific to local contexts. The main focus of the emerging
AIS Agricultural Innovation System is on how to strengthen workforce attitudes and
skills to innovate.
Most of the innovations needed in present day agriculture have collective
dimensions, that is they require new forms of interaction, organization and
agreement between multiple actors (Leeuwis and van den Ban, 2004; see also the
UK DFID ‘research into use’ approach) to shift the focus of attention away from
 168 W.M. Rivera

the generation of new knowledge to the ways in which that knowledge can be put
to productive use through the use, adoption, uptake and commercialization of
existing knowledge).
Playing this wider role requires large-scale restructuring and institutional change
which, by and large, the extension bureaucracies have been reluctant to undertake.
Reinforcing this reluctance is an extension policy dialogue that continues to be
couched in terms of a narrow conceptualization of extension. This narrow policy
dialogue envisions extension as an agency simply transferring technology and
improved practices from research stations to farmers (Sulaiman and Hall, 2005)
rather than recognizing extension’s complexity as is an integral component of larger
systems and wider conceptual frameworks. Figure 2 illustrates extension is not only a
component in the agricultural research, education and producer framework but a
critical contributor to the development of agricultural innovation systems and to the
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knowledge system as a whole.

Old and New Challenges

As agriculture becomes more specialized and industrialized, public sector agricultural
extension is thought to be less relevant since the private sector can more efficiently
provide technical assistance. This lack of relevance is thought to be especially true
where farms are large commercial enterprises and the information being transferred
for crop and animal production is primarily ‘precision technology’. Indeed, highly
specialized farmers increasingly bypass public sector extension and go directly
to private sector consultants, universities, or research agencies to obtain farm
information.
The tendency to by-pass agricultural extension has caused critics to question the
need for a public sector extension function. Ironically, however, this rather highlights

Agricultural Innovation System

(AIS)

Exporters
Agricultural Knowledge
Agro- & Information System (AKIS)
Processors
Agricultural
Producers Research
Organizations System
Agricultural
Input Suppliers
Education
Credit Agricultural Producers System
Agencies Extension
System
Land Agencies

Government Policy & Regulatory Framework

Figure 2. Extension as a component of a knowledge system.

Source: Adapted from Rivera et al. (2005).
 Public Sector Agricultural Extension System Reform 169

the need for public sector extension for small farmers since it is less feasible for them
to contact researchers or take advantage of private sources of knowledge. Indeed,
the World Bank justifies its support for public institutions such as research and
extension based on the public good nature of these institutions (Purcell and
Anderson, 1997). IFPRI, the International Food Policy Research Institute, argues
that to reduce poverty and food insecurity, ‘agricultural research and policy should
focus on improving agricultural productivity, particularly of small-scale farmers, in
low-income countries’ (Pinstrup-Anderson et al., 1997). Unfortunately, ensuring food
security and promoting national economic development are often incongruent.

Sustainable Agriculture. Agricultural sustainability is a major concern. National

public sector support is considered increasingly critical for safeguarding sustainable
agriculture and ensuring clean environments (Altieri, 1990). The challenge is for
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extension education programs to advance best management practices (BMPs) and the
development of integrated management systems (IMS).1 Governments tend to
establish market competitiveness priorities before sustainability and ecology protec-
tion policies. Thus, farmers attempting to become competitive are unaware of the
unsustainable nature of their resource use.
Natural resource management is an obvious, pressing and critical need, one for
which the public sector again has a crucial role to perform. The magnitude of the
human and ecological problems confronting the humid tropics in particular and the
environment in general is constantly featured in the news and increasingly
documented by research. Extension needs to assist farmers with environmental
management laws, as well as to assist with practices that serve to maintain a clean
environment.

A Clean Environment. In market-oriented schemes, extension tends to be strictly an

agricultural advisory service for producers who can afford to pay for the service,
usually on a contractual or fee-based basis. At the same time, however, countries such
as the Netherlands, have initiated national policy that promotes efforts that go
beyond production interests. That government is fostering sound environmental
practices through a combination of better-adapted technology, high-quality exten-
sion services, supportive legislation and regulations concerning pesticide and nutrient
use, and economic incentives that mobilize farmers for meaningful change (Proost
and Matteson, 1997).

Food Quality and Related Issues. Globally, extension issues have changed over
time and are continually changing. In the United States extension personnel are
increasingly referred to not as ‘agents’ but as ‘extension educators’ and ‘issue leaders’.
These educators engage in the enhancement of product quality, promotion of
food safety, and awareness concerning the transition to integrated pest management
(IPM), environmental problems and resource management. As well, they provide
impartial evaluation of new products and services, and validate and localize new
technology. Many of these issue leaders, according to a California farm advisor
(personal communication with Maxwell Norton, farm advisor, University of
California Cooperative Extension Service, Merced County), do not realize how
 170 W.M. Rivera

often they are engaging in these activities. Clean-environment issues will likely
demand development of new or redefined national extension services.

Social Equity. To base food security of a large part of the world’s population on
liberalized trade and a free market system is a high-risk social experiment. Fee-based
agricultural information transfer systems tend to be biased toward larger, wealthier
farm enterprises. Some fiscally redesigned public sector extension systems recognize
the special status of farmers with lower income levels and greater informational
transfer needs. Earlier on in OECD countries, projects for low-income users have
been offered at reduced prices (OECD, 1989; 1992).
Regardless, small-scale farmers often have less access to high-level agricultural
information. Fee-based reforms have received negative reactions from small farmers
who cannot afford the financial arrangements demanded by these newly constituted
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extension businesses. The United Kingdom’s fee-based funding arrangement has

been strongly criticized (Harter, 1992). Commercial agencies do not provide services
on an equal access basis. The focus is on clients whose profits can be maximized and
on areas with fertile soils and satisfactory infrastructure. This tendency reinforces
existing patterns of inequality in the distribution of rural incomes and services. As
international organizations such as the World Bank have recognized, the public
sector has a special role to perform in small farm development when this role is not
fostered by the private sector.

New Opportunities. New and emerging priorities are shaping extension. New
programmes and new clientele are already being developed. A new paradigm is
emerging. Some developing countries will likely lag behind in terms of expanded
programmes and mission. Much will depend on the type of developing country,2 its
stage of development and socioeconomic status, and its polity inclinations*toward a
dismantled state, an empowering state, or a decentralized state (Hambleton, 1992).
Various opportunities exist for extension’s development in the future. Advanced,
high quality public sector agricultural extension services are continually integrating
new messages into programmes for producers, especially those that are not being
covered by the private sector. Among these are: product quality enhancement, food
safety, transition to integrated pest management (IPM) and sustainable systems,
addressing environmental problems, resource management, impartial evaluation of
new products and services, and validating and localizing new technology. Extension
needs to be gender sensitive in its approach to these new opportunities for
development.
Extension’s clientele may vary and in some countries this includes the private sector,
agribusiness decision-makers, intermediaries and consultants, integrators, govern-
ment bureaucrats, legislators and regulators. In fact in some countries extension is
moving away from traditional farmer clientele and gradually toward less traditional
clients.

The Private Sector. As the world rushes toward extension reforms, and especially
privatization, food and agricultural businesses should be somewhat concerned since
private sector companies now and again utilize the expertise of national government
and extension services. In developed countries they consult government seed agencies
when cultivating and naming seed varieties, utilize nationally gathered data when
 Public Sector Agricultural Extension System Reform 171

developing products, and seek to develop joint research/extension ventures in various

sectors of crop and animal research. Research and technology-transfer linkages
between the public and the private sector have been shown to be important in both
developed and developing countries.

Other Extension Clients. New extension clients are coming onto the scene, namely
agribusiness decision-makers, intermediaries and consultants, integrators, government
bureaucrats, legislators and regulators. Extension’s audience in the United States, for
instance, is changing from one generally thought to be producers (Kalaitzandonakes
and Bullock, 1998). These less traditional clients include agribusiness decision-makers,
intermediaries and consultants, integrators, government bureaucrats, and regulators.
New trends and multiple agency programmes are coming into play. Extension is
once again being valued as a vehicle for non-formal education with, as mentioned
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earlier, new programmes such as Farmer Field Schools (FFS). FFS programmes
encourage and stimulate farmers to make their own decisions in contrast to the
command Training and Visit (T&V) programmes that instructed farmers what to do
and gave incentives through cheap credit to follow these instructions.
Farmer-to-farmer programmes are being promoted. Resource-poor farmers across
Latin America are finding a new way to increase productivity and improve their
livelihoods by forming committees known as local agricultural research committees,
or CIALs. Initiated by the CIAT international research center in Columbia, CIALs
began in the 1990s and have already expanded rapidly (Quirós Torres et al., 2004).
In 2005 there were already about 250 committees in eight countries of Central
and South America.

New Trends. In Latin America, for instance, urbanization (74% in 1998) is expected
to reach 83% of the population by the year 2020 (Sanchez-Griñan, 1998). This
process will involve socioeconomic and demographic changes that will affect food
and nutrition, as well as epidemiological, institutional and socio-demographic
changes. The same process is apparent in Asia and Africa, as well as in North
America and Western Europe. Food security, employability of youth in the food
industry, environmentally sound practices by small urban businesses, as well as other
food and agriculturally related programmes, are likely to demand the attention of
governments currently dismantling extension programmes. To conceive of extension
only as an agricultural-production, rather than an educational service is shortsighted
and limited.

New Technologies. The potential of new technologies such as computer networks,

cellular telepathy, distance education, expert systems and other electronic devices are
widespread in urban areas, but not yet so much in the rural sector.
Currently, many farmers do not have information about available markets. The
lack of communication between producers with one another and with others in
the market chain results in incomes and volumes that are lower than they could be.
MarketMaker, developed by the US Illinois Cooperative Extension Service, has the
potential to increase the volume of crops, as well as the incomes of producers and
others in the chain of supply. MarketMaker is currently adopted in 10 states in the
United States, and is expanding throughout the country. MarketMaker aids
agricultural producers in identifying new markets for products, developing a business
 172 W.M. Rivera

plan for value-added enterprises, developing a marketable agricultural-related

product, identifying potential funding sources for new ventures, and developing
networks with producers involved in similar ventures. MarketMaker also serves the
interests of food retailers and agribusiness owners because it links their needs to
agricultural producers. Products or venues, such as grocery stores, are shown on a
map so that people can locate them easily. Users join the web-based network for free
and can search for producers, processors, wholesalers, food retailers, eating and
drinking places, and farmers markets.
A project that has some similar elements to MarketMaker is the First Mile Project
which was implemented in Tanzania in 2005 by the International Fund for
Agricultural Development (IFAD). This agricultural market services development
project supports local farmers, traders, processors and others in learning how to
build a marketing chain from producers to consumers as well as how to operate
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commercial market access enterprises that link small farmers to others in the market
chain. It encourages the use of mobile phones and the internet so that rural producers
can link with one another and with others in the chain of supply.

Multiple Agency Programmes. Public sector extension in the more industrialized

countries is clearly expanding its mandate as agriculture overlaps with other social
and environmental issues. In such cases, extension provides services to a public whose
interests are pertinent to multiple government agencies, not just agriculture. For
example, the US Cooperative Extension Service via its urban education programmes
is already working with the US Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of
Housing for Urban Development, the Department of Defense, and the Department
of Justice.
In sum, new priorities are challenging extension to develop new programmes, new
methods, and new clientele. To date, extension’s main responsibility has been the
transfer of agricultural information to farmers and farm families. In the future, new
questions are likely to be raised as a result of socioeconomic, environmental, political
and technical developments. Responses to these new questions will eventually alter
ideas about whom should be served, the issues to be addressed, and who should
transfer extension services.

Upgrading the Extension Workforce: Reforming Extension’s Education and Training

Network
The education system in general and more specifically the agricultural education
system tend to be bonded to certain traditions. But these are not traditional times,
and change is a race with meeting challenges. This section suggests a broad view of
education and extension’s network of training relevance.

The Knowledge Imperative

A nation’s economic success depends in large part on the capacity of its workforce.
Development of sophisticated tools is linked to growth in sophistication of workers
(Wolf, 1998: 5). After the right of property, according to the former US Federal Bank
Chairman, Alan Greenspan (2004: 1), ‘the critical aspect of wealth creation . . .
globally, is the level of knowledge and skill of the population’. The challenge for
 Public Sector Agricultural Extension System Reform 173

public policymakers is to exploit new opportunities and comparative trade advantages in

the food and fiber industry to assure economic growth, food security, and employment
for growing populations. Those who work the land, those who market inputs and
participate in farm gate-to-market value-chain processes, and those who develop
and implement sector policies and regulatory systems, all need the skills, information
and insights to manage twenty-first century agriculture.
Producers and agribusinesses*large and small*must be able to operate in more
complex and interrelated production and market chains. Government regulators and
service providers must be up-to-date on modern technologies and global best
practice. Without knowledgeable producers, trained research and extension workers,
and competent administrators, programme managers and support staff, agricultural
systems are unlikely to remain competitive and sustainable, even if all other
production factors*land, water, production inputs, finance, etc., are available. To
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increase agricultural productivity and competitiveness, expanded training and

institutional capacity building efforts are as urgently needed now as in the early
days of the ‘green revolution’. Organizational and programme flexibility are needed
to adapt programmes and operations continuously as the agricultural sector
environment and market demands dictate.
Skills development is key to capacity building. The distinction between training
and capacity building merits clarification. Training in its varied forms is basically
development of human capacity. Institutional capacity building generally involves a
broader plan to enable an organization to meet its institutional goals. Organizations
need other assets to make trained staff productive and effective. This may include
buildings, equipment, support services, and operating costs. More important still are
the policies, procedures, and relationships the organization uses to achieve its
objectives. These soft assets depend fundamentally on the human resources in the
organization and the staff ability to develop, implement and revise appropriate
policies, procedures and relationships.
Training then is important both to build individual capacity to operate effectively
within the sector and to build specific capacity in individuals to further organiza-
tional objectives. For the latter, training must align with an organization’s goals in the
form of development-oriented training, not ad hoc or survival-type training
(Gooderham and Lund, 1992). Understanding organizational goals is essential to
capacity building and a prerequisite to any plan for training.
Agricultural education and training in an expanded systems complex is needed
as an integral part of any agricultural and rural development effort (Shepherd,
2007; Rivera et al., 2001). This paper suggests that public sector agricultural
education and training institutions need to broaden their curricula and develop
courses that in addition to production agriculture provide relevant education and
training in areas such as agricultural business, farm management, entrepreneurship,
marketing, organizational skills and knowledge, management and programme
development.
The challenge is to develop a strong tradition of entrepreneurial spirit among business
people, a high level of skill among workers, and openness by firms and workers alike to
intense competition within and beyond national borders.
Science in the twenty-first century is complex and requires expert knowledge.
In Latin America as elsewhere tropical agriculture varies from locale to locale
 174 W.M. Rivera

and also requires information and knowledge of an indigenous nature. Hence,

extension services call for agricultural professionals who are trained in modern
scientific knowledge and who also know how to associate with and learn from
farmers (Devcompage, 2008). There is today perhaps more than ever the knowledge
imperative for countries to compete in developing agriculture and markets. Implicit
in responding to this knowledge imperative is the challenge to professionalize
extension services*the leadership and managerial staff and of course field agents.
Training is but one element of an overall strategy to align extension with its mandate
and the objectives adopted within the overall context of its operating environment.
The overall strategy is to build capacity, to develop a learning organization capable
of a continuous self-development process.
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The Fourth Economic Pillar

Knowledge and information systems have come to be recognized as a fourth
economic pillar alongside those of land, labour and capital (Becker, 1964; Drucker,
1968). To paraphrase Peter Drucker, the great management task of this century will
be to make knowledge work productively, just as the great management task of the
last century was to make manual work productive (Drucker, 1968: 287).
Knowledge is what makes inputs productive and explains why some succeed
where others fail, even when they have the same access or use the same amount of
physical inputs (Ekboir et al., 2007, personal email), and knowledge has the potential
to increase output, even when the same amounts of inputs are used. Hence,
knowledge and information are keys to overcoming production constraints. The
knowledge imperative then is twofold: first, to foster efforts to acquire, develop,
distribute and use knowledge whether new or traditional, and secondly, to promote
knowledge that attains results as its primary goal.
For knowledge to work, however, educated and motivated human beings are the
primary resource. Human capital and human resource development in the broadest
sense are the sine qua non of development. Aside from financial capital, human
capital*the stock of productive skills and technical knowledge embodied in labour*
is paramount.
Institutionally, extension human resource development can and needs to occur in
three major settings: (1) the school system (i.e. the formal education and training
system), (2) the private and public workforce organizations (i.e. the shadow education
system), and (3) the nonformal educational support programmes*such as the
acquisition and transmission of rural knowledge and innovation (i.e. the parallel
education system).
It is not enough that knowledge be recognized as a fundamental fourth pillar
of modern development, the challenge is to pursue the continual acquisition and
application of knowledge. This fact demands a new look at the education system as a
whole, especially the relationship of post-secondary agricultural education and
training institutions with inservice training programmes that serve to prepare and
upgrade extension personnel and that enhance the knowledge and innovations
required to service producers.
A broad vista of human resource development (see Figure 3) is needed to
advance an agricultural workforce education network involving (1) those engaged in
 Public Sector Agricultural Extension System Reform 175

agricultural business and institutions that serve producers and (2) the agricultural
producers themselves. The challenge, as implied in Figure 3, is to connect formal
education, inservice training, and nonformal outreach programmes, and integrate new
knowledge with indigenous learning from producers in the field.

Final Comments
The Continuing Role of the Public Sector
Given the globalization of agricultural industry, major companies with worldwide
offices and facilities appear to be needed to accommodate modern agriculture.
However, economists are often fixed on major commodity products, ignoring how
bountiful small agriculture can be (Thompson, 1986; Rosset, 1999). Small farms in
the United States account for approximately one third of production (USDA, 1998).
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Public sector extension services cannot*should not*compete with private sector

extension-type services, nor repeat its targeted efforts in promoting specific,
contractual production programmes. The private (corporate) sector has already
become the ‘hegemon’, i.e., the dominant force in agriculture’s industry, and is a
dominant power in society*in agricultural development as well as politics.

Government Policy. Generally speaking, the function of public sector extension is

to take action to transfer and exchange information with either a broad or narrow
range of clientele (or target population). This ‘clientele’ may refer to agricultural
producers, rural communities, or urban populations and depends on government

Figure 3. Elements of an agricultural ‘Workforce Education Network’.

Source: Adapted from Rivera (1995).
 176 W.M. Rivera

policy. While extension’s function may be clear, its purpose will often enough differ
from country to country and even from place to place within a country. An
inordinate amount of academic literature exists, including the author’s own, arguing
one way or another what extension ‘should’ or ‘should not be’ for any one particular
purpose. Colleagues often dispute whether public sector extension should promote
only production agriculture, or one or all of the following: rural development through
non-agricultural micro-enterprise development, sustainable agriculture and natural
resource management, youth development, policy education, producer organization
programmes, and/or consumer protection. In some countries, Egypt for example,
extension undertakes family planning as one of its purposes. Extension is also being
challenged to respond to the HIV/AIDS epidemic (Qamar, 2003).
Public sector extension is what governments want it to be. Extension is defined
by policy and by the actions taken (or not taken, or inadequately performed)
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consequent to policy delivery (GTZ, 2001). Whether the instrument of government

(or the extension agency) is capable, qualified and motivated, to carry out the
government mandate is a distinct, though equally crucial question. The realpolitik
question nonetheless is: what do governments want public sector extension to do, if
anything.
Policymaking in developing countries tends to be the prerogative of central
authority. In less centralized countries, as Röling and Pretty (1997: 12) point out, it is
in practice ‘often the net result of the actions of different interest groups pulling in
complementary or opposing directions’. Röling and Pretty (1997) stress that the lack
of interaction among citizens and the reliance by central authorities on coercion and
control is the reason that so many, especially environmental, policies have failed. One
example of this kind of failure occurred in Madagascar (Laub-Fischer, 2002) with a
community forest project until finally the central authorities began to adopt a
facilitating role, leaving ownership and management of the forest in the hands of the
community.
Debate about what government should want extension to be and do covers a
broad array of ideas and approaches. Arguments reveal two basic and conflictive
perspectives: the view that considers agribusiness as orthodoxy with tenets based on
agribusiness economics (Freeman, 1989), and that which views agriculture as
best understood and practiced within the context of the environment and natural
phenomena (Edwards et al., 1990). Allied to this latter perspective are those
who advocate ‘small as bountiful’ and emphasize the importance of the human,
community and ecological side of agriculture (Thompson, 1986). Notable is the
increasing number of people who are becoming concerned about agriculture from an
environmental perspective, alarmed by its contribution to the degradation of the
planet’s land and water resources (e.g., IAASTD, 2008).
In short, the purpose that governments propose for extension differs widely.
Governments are likely to consider various options regarding how its systems
might perform (Rivera et al., 2001). Ultimately however, as argued herein, a
‘balance of powers’ approach is preferable in principle, with various and inter-
connected institutions contributing to the advancement of agricultural and rural
knowledge.
 Public Sector Agricultural Extension System Reform 177

The Challenges Ahead

This paper highlights a number of continuing as well as new challenges to be confronted
relevant to the development of agricultural extension systems and their reform. These
challenges may be taken as recommendations. For convenience, they are organized into
five areas: (1) extension specific, (2) extension post-secondary agricultural education
and training linkages, (3) poverty and (4) small farmers, and (5) general.

Extension Specific

1. Challenge to professionalize extension services*the leadership and manage-

rial staff and of course field agents, with a view to pursuing the continual
acquisition and application of knowledge.
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2. Challenge for extension to operate in a context where new knowledge and

technology are applied when appropriate.
3. Challenge for extension education programmes to advance best management
practices (BMPs) and the development of integrated management systems
(IMS).

Extension Post-secondary Agricultural Education and Training Linkages

4. Challenge to connect formal education, inservice training, and nonformal

outreach programmes.

Poverty and Small Farmers

5. Challenge to confront and alleviate rural poverty to the extent possible.

6. Challenge to provide extension for small-poor-subsistence farmers, to
complement private sector development and assure small farmers of food
security and advancement toward linkages with value-chain markets, or
otherwise assist them in moving toward other pathways out of agriculture.
7. Challenge for each country to find its own formula for reforming public
sector agricultural extension systems and not to succumb to fixed formulas.

General

8. Challenge for public policymakers to exploit new opportunities and

comparative trade advantages in the food and fiber industry to assure
economic growth, food security, and employment for growing populations.
9. Challenge to develop a strong tradition of entrepreneurial spirit among
business people, a high level of skill among workers, and openness by firms
and workers alike to intense competition within and beyond national borders.
10. Challenge to develop farmer economic interest groups to complement the
advancement of large agricultural industry.
 178 W.M. Rivera

In the final analysis, clear challenges confront extension: to support commercial

interests, to advance the worth of human capital, and to promote a knowledge
economy through the advancement of appropriate innovations.
In cases where the extension service is already privatized or operates as a function
of private sector companies, then government will likely be involved mainly as a
regulatory and possibly subsidizing or supportive agent as well as a client for special
programme development. However, the issue of providing extension to small, poor,
and subsistence farmers remains. And the problem of poverty reduction and food
security could become a major dilemma if not addressed head-on.
While the ideological shift from the welfare state to private-sector hegemony has
tended to reduce the involvement of some governments in public services, the
argument in this paper is that the so-called demise of the nation state is grossly
exaggerated. On the contrary, the state still determines what an institution such as
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extension will be; it determines whether, or if, agricultural extension will be privatized
and whether or not a national pluralistic system will be put into place. Moreover,
government continues to bear various responsibilities vis-à-vis both the commercial
sector and the general public good. Among these responsibilities, argued herein, is
government’s role in balancing sector interests in agricultural and rural development.
Economists, albeit with cautionary notes, are beginning to call for re-expansion of
the role of the state as an essential ingredient in policy development, regulation and
the provision of basic services, as well as in facilitating export growth (Khan, 2006).
Agriculture is increasingly systematized with consequent advantages and disadvan-
tages. This systematization is strongly impacting the demands on agricultural extension
systems regarding efficiency and direction. As noted herein, the present market-oriented
ideology and the advancement of e-technology are also radically affecting the priorities
and promise of agricultural extension. The challenges ahead for extension and its reform
are not so much issues of a system in transition but one which requires major overhaul.

Notes
1
Although these terms are often used interchangeably, integrated management systems follow such
practices as: (a) integrated pest management, (b) low intensity farm production systems, (c) crop rotation
designed to reduce pesticides, improve crop health, decrease erosion and fix nitrogen in the soil, and (d)
tillage and planting practices that reduce soil erosion and help control weeds. Best management practices
refer specifically to efforts that help return natural resources to a less polluted state.
2
In addition to low-income and least-developed categories, Kennedy (1993) has distinguished five types of
developing countries: (1) high-income oil-exporting countries, (2) industrializing economies in strong
states and relatively low levels of indebtedness (Taiwan, Korea, Singapore, Hong-Kong), (3)
industrializing economies with the state apparatus under challenge and/or with debt problems
(Argentina, Poland), (4) potential newly industrializing countries (Malaysia, Thailand), and (5) primary
commodity producers (in sub-Saharan Africa, Central America).

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