Nairobi, Kenya - Efforts to fight hunger and rural poverty, backed by billions of dollars, are being hampered by weak support for extension services and advice to enable smallholder farmers to produce more food and reap greater benefits from their harvest, development experts, farmers and innovators said at a conference in Nairobi, Kenya, Friday. Farm extension and rural advisory services occupy a strategic position in the agricultural production cycle, linking farmers to information about appropriate farming practices, when and what to plant, and how to use new technologies like seeds and soil management techniques developed by researchers.

Extension service providers also pass on feedback from farmers to policy makers and help to ensure that government policies are effectively meeting the needs of farmers.

“With the global population approaching nine billion by 2050, we need widespread adoption of farming practices that can sustainably increase yields in a changing climate to feed more people, while also creating new job and market opportunities to address high unemployment and poverty,” Michael Hailu, executive director of the Netherlands-based Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation, was quoted as saying in a statement by the organisation, which organised the conference.

“Smallholder farmers - particularly women - produce the bulk of food in developing countries, often under difficult circumstances,” he added. “National governments and international donors must redouble their efforts to boost smallholder agricultural production if we are to reverse persistent food insecurity and rural poverty.”

The conference, Innovations in Extension and Advisory Services, brought together some 400 leading global experts in agriculture development from 75 countries in Nairobi this week.

Seventy-five percent of the world’s poor live in rural areas, and most of them depend on agriculture for their livelihoods. Studies have shown that agricultural growth reduces poverty by twice the rate of growth in other sectors.

On average, there is one extension worker for every 4,000 farmers in Africa. Although the situation has improved in some countries like Kenya, where the ratio is one to every 1,470 farmers, it is still far below the ideal of one extension officer for every 400 farmers.

Experts at the conference agreed that technology that can disseminate information to farmers beyond face-to-face interaction is crucial to filling this gap.

“Roughly 60 percent of Africa’s population is involved in agriculture. That’s 600 million people,” said Monty Jones, World Food Prize laureate and executive director of the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA). “To increase agricultural productivity and reach the broader agricultural sector, we must focus on quality investments in technologies and knowledge that can cost effectively reach these farmers and increase their awareness of new innovations.”

The rise of community radio stations across Africa, combined with the mobile phone revolution, have the potential to transform the extension and advisory sector, according to experts at the meeting.

Call-in programmes have turned radio into an interactive tool that gives a voice to farmers, and SMS services provide farmers with timely market information.

For example, there are several projects in West Africa that are testing the use of SMS to give farmers market prices, extension advice, and even information on appropriate social and health-related issues.

The Scientific Animations Without Borders (SAWBO) project uses Bluetooth technology to transmit videos that provide farmers with farming and health advice, such as control strategies for insects that attack cowpea plants and cholera prevention.

The CTA is a joint international institution of the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States and the European Union (EU), and its mission is to advance food and nutritional security, increase prosperity and encourage sound natural resource management in ACP countries.

It provides access to information and knowledge, facilitates policy dialogue and strengthens the capacity of agricultural and rural development institutions and communities.

Pana 19/11/2011