National Agricultural Extension Strategy

To overcome the main changes of the agriculture sector the Government of Rwanda has adopted the National Agricultural Extension Strategy whose Vision is to ensure ideal conditions for the dissemination and exchange of information between producers, farmer organizations and other different partners in order to transform and to modernize the agricultural sector so that this sector can effectively contribute to achieve the millennium development goals, Vision 2020, and the Economic Development and Poverty Reduction Strategy objectives.
The Global objective of the National Agricultural Extension Strategy is to contribute to the professionalisation of producers and to the effective adoption of innovations, in order to increase, diversify, specialize and intensify agricultural production, under conditions of economic profitability for the State and for farmers households while preserving the environment.
The specific objectives of National Agricultural Extension Strategy are: (i) to promote farmer organisations and to encourage their participation in agricultural sector stakeholders “concertation” platforms, (ii) to strengthen technical capacities of producers, (iii) to improve services delivery to producers in the perspective of gradual disengagement of the public sector from extension service delivery, (iv) to promote a system of participatory research adapted to the needs of producers.
The following are the strategic axes to achieve the objectives of national agricultural extension strategy: (i) promotion of partnership between public sector, private sector, local and international NGOs, Farmer organisations, research and education agricultural institutions, (ii) promotion of farmer organisations by priority commodities, (iii) experimentation in farmer’s fields and establishment of a network of farmer researchers, (iv) promotion of Voluntary farmer’s extension services providers, (v) promotion of Rural Innovation Community Centers, (vi) promotion of agricultural competitions, (vii) progressive disengagement of public sector from extension service delivery in favour of private extension service delivery.
In order to make agriculture, forestry and fisheries more productive and sustainable, the following will be implemented by the strategy: (i) to collect available data for Districts agricultural planning; (ii) to coordinate all activities related to agricultural planning on District level, (iii) to invite MINAGRI agencies and other partners at District level to take part in District agricultural development planning and annual action plans, (iv) to support Sectors in agricultural activities planning, (vi) to organize and supervise activities related to agricultural demonstrations, farm field’s schools, organization of farm to farm visits, participative identification of problems and solutions, experimentation in farmers fields.
Regarding the reduction of the rural poverty, the government plans to organise technical and organisational training needs assessment for both public and private extension workers and to communicate this information to relevant agencies, and other partners and to evaluate needs related to training material and other means of work for extension workers and farmers and to communicate them to relevant agencies or organizations.
To increase the resilience of livelihoods to disasters, the government plans to implement a number of key strategies including: to ensure that instructions related to animal and crops diseases are respected, to alert quickly agencies and other relevant authorities in case of natural disasters.
In the context of governance, this strategy will be implemented at national, district, sector, cell and village level the functions at different levels are basically the same but are done sequentially in order to plan, monitor and evaluate effectively. In case of emergencies, the approach will be adjusted accordingly to enable rapid action, but with emphasis on the ownership. The system has to be flexible. In case of available funding at sector and district levels, implementation of agricultural extension activities and programs as identified by farmers’ needs, should start, while information will be passed on to the National Agricultural Extension Committee (NAECOC).