THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: In order to review the agriculture extension scene in Kerala and seek and provide mutual support among the institutions, Nabard has convened a State-level consultation meet here on December 1.

Agriculture Minister Mullakkara Ratnakaran will inaugurate it at the Nabard's auditorium.

Agriculture extension has been primarily the responsibility of Government departments and agriculture universities.

They impart the information regarding transfer of technology, package of practices and the technological advances in agriculture.

Later, commodity boards, research institutions and banking sector also entered the arena of agriculture extension. With effective extension, there was increased production, improved productivity and enhanced credit to the farmers.

Extension has been the key support to agriculture and agriculturists.

However, more is required to be done in agricultural extension, such as high-tech commercial agriculture, situation specific solutions, disaster management, integrated pest management, modern irrigation techniques etc.

Agriculture has now become highly competitive and needs to be practiced as business. The requirements of farmers have changed to market information, exports, international trading, precision farming as well.

The meet will review the status of agricultural extension in Kerala with reference to the role of each institution, strengths and limitations in delivery of extension services, best practices adopted by different institutions, new experiments/ methods adopted in recent times on extension services and mutual/ bilateral linkages and evolve a Kerala-specific action plan for agriculture extension.

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