This brief summarises the publication ‘Mobilising the potential of rural and agricultural extension’ that was prepared for the Global Conference on Agricultural Research for Development (GCARD) in Montpellier, March 2010. Rural advisory services are key to putting smallholder demands at the centre of rural development, ensuring food security, and dealing with risks and uncertainty. The brief focuses on five opportunities to mobilise the potential of rural advisory services.
Agriculture and food supply face a repositioning in the context of challenges associated with the Millennium Development Goals. From a development perspective it is of central importance to identify the role that the sector should perform in the fight against...
There is renewed attention on the importance of advisory services and extension in rural development processes. This paper, based on the publication ‘Mobilizing the potential of rural and agricultural extension', focuses on five opportunities to mobilise the potential of extension...
The Global Forum for Rural Advisory Services (GFRAS) has commissioned the Natural Resources Institute to develop a toolkit for the evaluation of extension (projects, programmes, tools and initiatives). This commission has a number of components:
- A meta-evaluation of 15-20...
This brief report lays out ten theories of advocacy and policy change. These theories are intended to articulate the policy making process and identify causal connections supported by research to explain how and why a change may or may not...
This brief explains the concept of gender equality in advisory services and discusses the opportunities that gender equality in rural advisory services can create for global and local food production, women’s economic empowerment, household food security, and nutrition. It summarises...