Analyses On The Current Situation Of The Agricultural Extension System At Grassroots Level And The Constraints To Its Operation

Before the re-structuring, the management of the agricultural extension systems at grassroots level in Guangxi Autonomous Region followed the pattern combining vertical and horizontal administration, having the vertical one as the major. It means that the extension agencies at township level were the branch of the county agricultural institute that was responsible for the personnel, financial and physical management over the agencies. The re-structuring of government in the early 2002 united the various agencies such as agriculture, machinery, forestry, economic management, animal husbandry and fishery, water and soil conservation, etc. at the township level into the integrated agricultural service center that became an institute with full budget allocated from the government above level and administrated by the township government in the aspects of personnel, funds and physical materials.The thesis took the agricultural service centers at the township level in Liujiang County as the cases for study, and adopted RRA (Rapid Rural Appraisal) and PRA (Participatory Rural Appraisal) as the main methodology of research. The operational situations of the centers and the constraints to their operation were systematically researched with case studies, Semi-Structured Interview, individual interview, group discussion, questionnaire survey and review of secondary information. Accordingly, the recommendations for the improvement and reform of the extension systems were proposed.The main findings and conclusions of the research include: Since the re-structuring, the personnel quota of the township centers had been reduced significantly, the integration and synergy increased; the average age of the staff become younger, and the efficiency and accountability increased; more contribution made to the increase of crop and animal production and farmer's income and the development of rural areas, which got praised by the stakeholders. However, there are still quite a lot of constraints under current institutions to the sound operation of the extension centers, including shortage of extensionists, reduced times of training, too low of payment, unsuitability of their knowledge and skills to the new requirement of agricultural development, vaguer in the responsibilities and duties, lack of operational fund, lack of coordination among staff, poor management of the assets and physical materials, backward in the concepts and ideas about extension, weak in administration, etc. These factors restricted the full play of the roles and functions of the centers, and the dissemination and adoption of the new agricultural technologies, varieties and products.Oriented to those constraints and current situations of the extension systems at grassroots level level, the following recommendations were proposed such as re-examining the personnel quota, clarifying the administration mechanism and functions, renewing the ideas about extension, increasing fund and improving the working conditions, strengthening training and learning, implementing the objectives-based management, trying the establishment of district extension stations, and protecting the assets of the extension agencies during the restructuring.