The purpose of this piece of work is to investigate, through a literature review, the role of intermediaries in agricultural extension and rural development. In the first place, a general view of the roles of intermediaries, as depicted in literature, is presented. Then, one of the main types of intermediaries, facilitators is outlined based on a comprehensive review of the literature, particularly in the healthcare sector. Following, the emergence of facilitators in agricultural literature is explored pointing to a new understanding of facilitation which implies its transformation from exploitation to exploration, i.e. from information dissemination to co-learning facilitation. A number of examples from agriculture-related literature illustrate such an argument. This review points to the fact that, at least as far as agriculture-related theory and practice are concerned, intermediaries as co-learning facilitators signify rather new roles requiring specific and, to a large degree, unexplored skills. Given that that there is still a number of issues threatening the efficacy of facilitators it is argued that there is an urgent need for facilitation to be better described, operationally defined and well-evaluated so as to allow for both a better interpretation and guidance of practice.
This Guide to Evaluating Rural Extension has been developed by the Global Forum for Rural Advisory Services (GFRAS). The purpose is to support those involved in extension evaluation to choose how to conduct more comprehensive, rigorous, credible and useful evaluations....
En esta serie de manuales se proponen acciones para el fortalecimiento de capacidades de gestión asociativa y agroempresarial. Para lograrlo, se presentarán instrumentos, experiencias y prácticas que han dado buenos resultados. Este saber acumulado surge de un conocimiento práctico que...
The process of knowledge brokering in the agricultural sector, where it is generally called agricultural extension, has been studied since the 1950s. While agricultural extension initially employed research push models, it gradually moved towards research pull and collaborative research models....
This paper examines how the different institutional innovations arising from various permutations of linkages and interactions of ARD organizations (national, international advanced agricultural research centres and universities) influenced the different outcomes in addressing identified ARD problems. A multi-institutional, multi-disciplinary phased...
The first phase in the development of the Common Framework on Capacity Development for Agricultural Innovation systems (CD for AIS) consisted of the review of the existing literature, building up a repository of relevant documentation on agricultural innovation in general and AIS and CD...