APPROACHES IN EXTENSION

An extension approach is an organized and coherent combination of strategies and

methods designed to make rural extension effective in a certain area.

Strategies are approaches and methods chosen or developed to reach a particular set of
goals; used to define the operational design by means of which a national government,
or other sponsoring organizations, implements its policies.

Mass Approach

The Farming Systems Development Approach

Assumes that technology which fits the needs of farmers, particularly small
farmers, is not available and needs to be generated locally
Aims to provide extension personnel (and through them farm people) with
research results tailored to meet the needs and interests of local farming system
conditions.
The control of the program is shared jointly by local farm people, extension
officers and researchers
In each particular location, the program actually fits the needs and interests of its
clientele and they are more likely to participate over time, adopt recommended
practices and support continuity of the total agricultural extension program
Implementation is through a partnership between research and extension
personnel
The cost can be quite high
The approach brings results slowly
Reporting and administrative control is difficult

Commodity Approach

An organized and coherent combination of extension strategies and methods

which facilitate the production of one specific commodity.
Extension content is limited to technical and administrative of commercial
aspects of the production of a commodity
Concentrates on one cash crop and provides all elements of the mix necessary
for growing it, including marketing and price controls
Each individual farmers has direct contact with the board/society
Technology tends to fit the production problems and the messages which
extension officers send to growers tend to be appropriate
Extension activities tend to be coordinated, messages delivered is timely, focus
on a narrow range of technical concerns, easier to monitor and evaluate, more
cost effective
Interest of farmers may have less priority over those of the production
organization
Does not provide advisory service to other aspects of farming if farmers like to
produce more than one commodity
It may contradict with national production program

Area Approach
Scheme Approach

An organized and coherent combination of extension strategies and methods

which ails at the reinforcement of the rules and regulations of the scheme
The management control most of the production factors
Decisions about innovation are all taken by one management
Allow results in a short time and can be expanded to include large numbers of
people
Success depends on the quality of management
Often used not for rural welfare but for extraction of wealth out of rural areas
Capital costs per unit area or household are always high and schemes are
always administration and management intensive
Unless it is designed and controlled very much according to rules which fit the
farmers’ needs, and unless the scheme yields results which farmers perceive as
beneficial, scheme approach hardly works

Team Approach

The Target Category Approach

An extension approach which provides carefully selected information and other

support for the specific needs of deliberately chosen categories in the population
Target categories are formed on the basis of similarities of their needs and/or
opportunities
Selective delivery of opportunities is successful to the extent that they benefit
only members of target categories

The Functional Group Approach

Is an extension approach where one of the prime targets is to form groups of

persons who join their efforts in order to mobilize the necessary resources to be
able to achieve a shared goal.
The change in behavior of participants is carried out by 5 different elements:
mobilization, organization, training, technical and resource support and special
efforts to consolidate and replicate the results.
Installing new opportunities for the rural poor requires understanding of their own
situation, its potential for change and their own possible role in it.
Making use of opportunities usually requires that the rural poor decide on some
form of organization to allow collective decision making, collective responsibility,
resource pooling and other collaborative arrangements, as well as a participative
structure and a single voice in dealing with outside forces.
Developing and utilizing opportunities usually requires new local, technical and
organization roles
Developing and utilizing opportunities and local projects requires technical and
resource support if tangible results are to materialize
Crucial role in the system includes starting up functional groups and agency
support, maintaining the linkages between them, mobilizing, organizing and
training new functional groups, initiating local development projects, providing
starter loans, lobbying for support from agencies, so forth.
The Farmers Organization Approach

Independent, self-management and in most cases, permanent organizations are

formed with the objective to propagate some kind of social or economic
development for the members
Requires a relatively high degree of mobilization of the farmers, as well as the
capacity to manage their own affairs on a communal basis
Requires government policy that facilitates or tolerates the emergence of a
farmers’ lobby and is willing to look upon the organizations as partners in
development

Individual Approach

The Project Approach

Assumes that the large government bureaucracy is not likely to have a significant
impact upon either agricultural production or rural people, and that better results
can be achieved in a particular location, during a specified time period with large
infusions of outside resources
Assumes that high impact activities, carried under artificial circumstances, will
have continuity after outside financial support diminishes
Aims to demonstrate within the project area, what can be accomplished in a
relatively short period of time
Measure of success is usually short run change at the project site
Time period is usually too short and amount of money provided tends to be more
than adequate
Flow of ‘good ideas’ from the project area to other places
Tendency that when money ends, so does the project

Integrated Approach

General Agricultural Extension Approach

Dominant approach for the last 80 years

It assumes that technology and information are available and not being used by
farmers; if communicated to farmers, farm practices would be improved
Its purposes is to help farmers increase their production
Success is measured by the increase in national production of the commodities
being emphasized in the national program
Provides for relatively rapid communication for the department level to rural
people
Typically lacks two-way of information, communication about farmers’ problem,
needs and interest tend not to follow-up through the extension channel used
Reflecting national goals and targets fails to adjust the messages for each
different locality
Field staff are not accountable to the rural people of the area in which they are
working
Expensive and inefficient
The Technical Change Approach
 An extension approach which aims at the maximum adoption of a number of
innovations
Most common approach followed in agricultural development
Technical information is diffused indiscriminately (but not necessarily
strategically) within the rural society
Farmers are free whether or not to receive the information and to try, adopt or
reject the innovation
Innovations are introduced to a small number of “selected farmers” in the hope
that autonomous diffusion processes will multiply the impact of the intervention
Technology or the packages offered to farmers are often inappropriate or
incomplete
Technology development is left to research institutions which may not take into
account farming systems and farmers’ production objectives
Utilization of technology is hindered because information, goods and services are
not offered in the mix necessary from the producers’ point of view
Problem on the heterogeneity of rural populations in terms of their access to
resources and their farming systems
Extension has only direct contact with minority of the farmers
Seems usually unsuitable for poverty alleviation

Training and Visit Approach

Spread rapidly since mid-70s

Assumes that extension field personnel are poorly trained, not up-to-date and
tend not to visit farmers
There is a fix schedule of training of village extension workers and farmers
Decisions of what to be taught, when it be taught tend to be made by the
professionals and the program is delivered down to the farmers
Implementation relies basically on visits by village level extension workers to
small groups of farmers or to individual contact farmers
Funds come from large international loans
Teaches farmers how to make the best of available resources
Brings discipline and devotion to their work for the extension officers
High long-term costs to government in expanding size of field extension staff
Lack of two-way communication between research and extension staff
Lack of flexibility to change program

Participatory Models and Approaches

The Agricultural Extension Participatory Approach

Includes participation by personnel of agricultural research and service

organizations, as well as farmers
Concerned with broad range of agricultural subjects, shifting local focus as
village problems change or as new needs arise
Assumes that farming people have much wisdom regarding production of food
from their land, but levels of living and productivity could be improved by learning
Aims to increase production of farming people and increase the consumption and
enhance quality of life of rural people
 Participation in program planning increases exposure to different sources of
information, awareness of new information and practices, confidence on new
practices and in oneself, initiative and adaptation rate and productivity
Extension workers are not only agricultural educators, but also animators and
catalysts to stimulate farmers to organize group effort
Success is measured on the continuity of local extension organizations, benefits
to the community, extent to which agricultural research personnel and others
actually participate in both planning and implementation
Cost less because local associations facilitate communication making whole
system more efficient
Caters to both human and technical side of extension
Lacks central control of program which may lead to competition and confusion
Difficult to manage central reporting and accounting since program shift as local
conditions change
The issue whether participation of local people actually influences management
decisions

General Principles of the Approaches of Agricultural Extension

1. Success of an extension program is directly related to the extent to which the

approach fits program goals.
2. Participation of rural people tends to facilitate learning and adoption of improved
farm.
3. Effectiveness of an extension program varies directly with the extent of discipline
and seriousness among personnel.
4. Effectiveness depends on the extent to which goals of the program are clearly
understood by responsible personnel.
5. Sustainability depends on the extent to which benefits to both sponsors and
clients are greater than costs.
6. Information from both indigenous knowledge and international scientific
knowledge systems tend to be more effective than those which utilize technical
information only.
7. Particular approaches will be most successful when they fit national aspirations.
8. Cultural factors need to be considered in planning any extension program.
9. Approaches used should be gender sensitive.
10. More participatory approaches tend to fit best in national systems where public
administration is more decentralized.
11. Approach should encourage two-way communication linkages between and
among sponsors and clients.
12. An approach is effective if it could develop sustained, vigorous, dynamic and
creative leadership.