CRISP led the development of the Global Position Paper “The New Extensionist: Roles, Strategies and Capacities to strengthen Extension and Advisory Services” for the Global Forum for Rural Advisory Services (GFRAS).
Extension and advisory services (EAS) play an important role in agricultural development. However, these services need new capacities to address the current challenges in agriculture and to contribute better to agricultural innovation. The new extensionist is a global view of extension and advisory services that reinvents and clearly articulates the role of EAS in the rapidly changing rural and agricultural context. It argues for an expanded role for EAS within Agricultural Innovation Systems (AIS) and the development of new capacities at different levels to play this role. CRISP is also partnering with the GFRAS Consortium on Extension Education and Training which is currently developing learning materials based on the New Extensionist Document.