The Comparative Study On Agricultural Extension System Between Pakistan And China

Rising population of world is threatening the problems of food in-security. To defeat these threats, there is premeditated call for enhancement in the competencies and skills of extension field staff as well as rural farming communities. Consequently, these capabilities will make farmers confident toward sustainable crop production and protection by increasing their farm produce that will lead towards global food security. Therefore, to achieve this task the agricultural extension system must be modernized and well organized to support sustainable agricultural development and to develop the capacity of farming community in different ways by using different modernized and advanced mechanisms, approaches and advisory services. The advanced countries like Australia,Canada, Denmark and United States of America, have developed better extension services in public as well as in public-private sectors. However, the developing world is still facing difficulties in agricultural extension and advisory services. Agricultural extension system should be modernized owing to change in the environment, increasing population and food security issues. Keeping in view current scenario of developing countries present PhD study was intended to compare agricultural extension system between Pakistan and China. For this comparative study 160 farmers from four districts of Punjab province in Pakistan and 122 respondent farmers from Hebei province in China were considered as samples of the study and data were collected with the help of validated questionnaire by using face-to-face interview method. Comparison of both countries was accomplished by using different parameters like demographic attributes(age, education, family size,land holding, occupation etc.) of farmers, their behavior towards agricultural extension services and different sources of agricultural information for farmers and effect of different factor on accessibility of farmers from different information sources. Data collected were analyzed by using applying logistic model. The results of current study indicated that demographic attributes of farmers(age, education, family size, land holding, occupation etc.) have significant impact on acceptance behavior of farmers towards agricultural extension services provided by public sectors of Pakistan and China. Similarly, these factors also influence the accessibility of farming community to different agricultural information sources. On the basis of results it was suggested that government of Pakistan should launch some programs to involve youth in agriculture similarly,the government of China should foster the involvement of more youth in agriculture and both countries should introduce farmers’ friendly policies. Moreover government of Pakistan should reorganize agricultural extension system and enhance competencies of extension field staff to make farming community capable to improve farm production, and media role must be boosted up to ensure availability of agricultural information for farmers likely, government of china should also involve private sector to provide agricultural information to farmers.