Changing Role of Agricultural Extension in India: From Technology Transfer to Digital, Market-Linked and Networked Advisory Systems

Abstract

Agricultural extension in India is passing through a significant transition. For decades, extension was largely understood as a public mechanism for transferring technologies, improved practices, and research-based recommendations from laboratories and universities to farmers. That role remains foundational, but the environment in which farmers now take decisions has become far more complex. Agriculture is increasingly shaped by climate variability, market volatility, changing pest dynamics, rising input costs, diversification into high-value crops, quality and traceability requirements, and rapid growth of digital communication channels. At the same time, farmers no longer depend only on formal extension institutions for information. They now receive advice from mobile applications, social media platforms, agri-startups, FPOs, local influencers, input networks, and peer communities. Recent policy developments reflect this shift. Bharat-VISTAAR, launched in Phase I on 17 February 2026, has been positioned by the Government of India as an AI-based multilingual farmer advisory platform accessible through multiple channels, including phone, chatbot, web portal, and app, and integrating information on schemes, weather, market prices, crop advisory, and grievance support. Public extension systems are therefore being called upon to move beyond one-way dissemination of technology and become systems of decision support, risk communication, knowledge validation, and market readiness. This article argues that the future of agricultural extension lies in combining the credibility of field-based public institutions with the scale of digital systems, the immediacy of social media, and the participatory energy of peer-led agricultural communication. It also highlights the continuing importance of ATMA, BTM, and ATM structures, the urgent need for capacity building of extension workers, and the emerging challenge of fake, unverified, commercially motivated, and misleading digital media content in agriculture.