Introduction

Mainland Southeast Asia is exposed to climate and development forces, characterised by extreme impacts from climate change (e.g. drought, floods) and large-scale infrastructure development such as hydropower dams (Kang et al. 2021). These compounding stressors have profound impacts on the agricultural sector (Barrett and Rose 2022), which is the backbone for the national economy of many countries, especially those in the Lower Mekong Basin (LMB) (Cosslett and Cosslett 2018). Previous studies have explained how coupled climate and development forces have (re)shaped livelihood pathways of agrarian communities in Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam (Kong and Castella 2021; Suhardiman and Rigg 2021; Tran and James 2017). While these externalities present critical environmental challenges in these countries, there remains need for analysis of how these factors influence ongoing agrarian transitions, including their influence on how agricultural extension might evolve in support of agricultural and rural development.

While agrarian transitions in the global North have advanced significantly under the accelerating process of industrialisation, they remain “very much underway” in the developing societies of the global South (de Koninck 2004; p. 285). The LMB has witnessed agrarian transitions characterised by the accelerating agricultural mechanisation in tandem with the increased engagement into global and regional markets (Baird et al. 2022; Green 2022a). This is manifested respectively by the transition from traditional agricultural to commercialised production systems, including soybean, maize, and cassava in Laos and Cambodia (Cole and Rigg 2019; Kong et al. 2018) and rice in Vietnam (MARD 2022). These momentums, albeit to varying degrees, have trickled into the everyday agrarian change within rural societies, demonstrated by: (1) the increased use of externally produced inputs (e.g. seeds, pesticide, and fertiliser); (2) the increased production of a marketable surplus; (3) the progressive removal of state-imposed control on farming; and (4) the greater role of commercial decisions in farm management (Cramb 2020). However, little is known about how these processes are linked to agricultural extension in responding to evolving needs that are adversely affected by multiple drivers of change in the LMB.

Agricultural extension, also known as agricultural advisory services, plays a pivotal role in promoting agricultural and rural development (Hanyani-Mlambo 2002). It is defined as “systems that should facilitate the access of farmers, their organisations and other market actors to knowledge, information and technologies; facilitate their interaction with partners in research, education, agribusiness, and other relevant institutions; and assists them to develop their own technical, organisational and management skills and practices” (cited in Danso-Abbeam et al. 2018; p. 2). Agricultural extension offers a “non-formal education” (FAO 2003, p. 7) and facilitates interactions between extensionists and farmers (Cook et al. 2021). It also serves as a political and organisational instrument to facilitate development (FAO 2003). Traditionally, agricultural extension involves the top-down transfer of scientific knowledge, with extensionists assuming a key position in knowledge dissemination (Chambers and Ghildyal 1985). Yet, contemporary agrarian transitions have created new challenges and demands for farming systems, urging agricultural extension agencies to re-define their objectives, plans, and development strategies (Barrett et al. 2018). This implies a shift away from the linear modes of knowledge and technology transfer, which solely focused on productivity improvement (Koutsouris 2018), towards muti-stakeholder engagement in extension. This paves a way for the development of a pluralistic engagement approach aimed at fostering knowledge exchange through diverse learning platforms (Birner et al. 2009). It enables farmers to improve their technical skills and capacity in agricultural production (Danso-Abbeam et al. 2018), while also offering space for their engagement in extension activities (Blum et al. 2020; Tran and Rodela 2019). In the authoritarian regimes of the LMB countries though, the pluralistic engagement approach is not formally recognised, especially in the domain of agricultural and rural development.

The compounding challenges of climate change (e.g., El Niño effects), infrastructural development (e.g. hydropower dams), and regional and global market dynamics are the key influences on agrarian transitions in the LMB. They facilitated wider shifts in agricultural development policies and practices (Nguyen et al. 2023b; Ornetsmüller et al. 2018; Jansen and Kalas 2023; VCCI 2022). While these processes exhibit a general trend towards modernising the agricultural sector at the regional scale, limited attention has been given to comparative dynamics of agrarian transitions at the national scale. Additionally, there remains a dearth of knowledge concerning how agricultural extension services can effectively enhance their operations to meet evolving demands of agricultural and rural development at the local scale.

This paper sheds light on how agrarian transitions underpin change in structures, visions, and operational paradigms of agricultural extension across the case study countries: Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. It demonstrates how agricultural extension is evolving away from its predominant ‘business-as-usual’ practices, while simultaneously striving to deal with emerging needs under agrarian transitions. Unravelling these relational spheres requires the undertaking of in-depth inquiries into three main areas: (1) how drivers of change (e.g. climate change, capitalist development) shape agrarian transition pathways across the case study countries; (2) how agricultural extension responds to the demands arising from agrarian transitions; and (3) how efforts to enhance agricultural extension performance allow for the co-learning among stakeholders and the production of innovative extension models. The paper addresses these knowledge gaps by responding to the following research questions:

  1. 1.

    How do agrarian transitions occur in the case study countries?

  2. 2.

    How do agricultural extension systems respond to the demands arising from the agrarian transitions?

  3. 3.

    What challenges have extensionists faced in dealing with the evolving demands?

  4. 4.

    How do champions facilitate the co-production of innovative agricultural extension models in addressing challenges in agricultural and rural development?

Drawing on empirical insights from interviews with international and regional experts, this paper argues that agrarian transitions not only put a strain on agricultural extension systems in responding to evolving needs, but they also stimulate the co-production of innovative agricultural extension models to address gaps left by the limited presence of extensionists. Through the research questions and case studies, this paper moves beyond the narrow analysis of how these contemporary issues are reflected in a ‘single country’ context (Cole and Rigg 2019; Green 2022a; McElwee et al. 2023). Rather, it contributes an overarching understanding of causal relationships between agrarian transitions and agricultural extension under compounding climate and development pressures. At the regional scale of the LMB, it demonstrates the ways in which these dynamics stimulate the development of innovative extension models in response to wider agrarian change.

Agrarian transitions in the LMB

Agrarian studies often emphasise agrarian transitions, focusing on key periods of change as opportunities to improve understanding. The scholarship of agrarian transitions often delves into examining how capitalist production systems expand into rural spaces, configure, and restructure social relations (Castella et al. 2023). It also focuses on the process of transformation by agrarian societies from agriculture-dependent towards more industrialised and market-oriented modes of production (Alexander et al. 2017; Beban and Gironde 2023). In the present-day context of Southeast Asia, agrarian transitions are not solely reducible to capitalist commodification, but are also influenced by a multitude of complex and interrelated factors, such as land, agricultural technologies, climate change, and various forms of structural development (Addison and Schnurr 2016; Castella 2012; Schoenberger et al. 2017).

Agrarian transitions encompass complex narratives of development, primarily triggered by the expansion of capitalist agricultural production models and agricultural commercialisation (Sugden et al. 2022). In the LMB, these transitions involve issues regarding state-imposed land controls for lease, transfers, and concessions (Baird 2020; Diepart and Sem 2018; Nanhthavong et al. 2022; Schoenberger et al. 2017), local and trans-border dynamics of livelihood change, poverty reduction, and rural development (Barney 2013; IOM 2021; Rigg 2006), as well as mounting household debts incurred from the shift towards commodified agricultural production (Green 2022b; Guermond et al. 2023).

Agrarian transitions in the LMB are also shaped by food production policies pushed by national governments, which often prioritises export-oriented strategies in response to high demands from large markets such as China (Green 2022a). This has led to widespread transitions of agricultural systems across ecological zones. In upland areas, for example, the transitions were exhibited by the rapid conversion of farmland into extensive mono-cropped systems, such as cassava and maize, resulting in crop boomsFootnote 1 (Belton and Fang 2022; Castella et al. 2023). In lowland areas, the transitions manifest a remarkable change in rice production systems, shifting from quantity- to quality-oriented policies to enhance access to global and regional food markets (Baird et al. 2022; Manivong and Cramb 2020; MARD 2022). While these processes present multiple challenges for institutions and agrarian communities to adapt, they underline how agrarian transitions require change in agricultural extension in responding to evolving demands.

While evidence of agrarian transitions is dominated by case studies and approaches from developed countries (de Boon et al. 2022a; de Koninck 2004), how these processes take place in the LMB contexts, which are currently faced with the plethora of complexities such as climate change (e.g. droughts), hydropower development (Hecht et al. 2019; Hoang et al. 2019; Keovilignavong et al. 2023), and frequent global market instability (Beban and Gironde 2023; Castella et al. 2023; Nguyen et al. 2023b), are insufficiently understood. In particular, little is known about how agrarian transitions are shaped by these compounding dynamics, which together serve as a ‘push’ for the transformation of regional agricultural extension landscapes. By focusing on the three case study countries (Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam) in consideration of how these changing processes have taken place in the region (Table 1), we investigate how agrarian transitions give rise to new demands, especially from rural farmers, and how they stimulate a paradigm shift in public extension operations and enhanced capacities of extensionists to better address the farmers’ needs.

Table 1 Drivers and processes of agrarian transitions in the case study countries
Full size table

Agricultural extension in changing contexts

Agrarian transitions reveal opportunities for exploring how agricultural extension accommodates change in the ways it provides extension services and facilitates the transfer of knowledge. There are debates over how agricultural technology could be effectively and efficiently transferred to farmers (Friederichsen et al. 2013). Theoretically, agricultural extension aims to facilitate the dissemination of global knowledge and local research to farmers, empowering them to define their own goals and possibilities. It also seeks to educate farmers as they make decisions, attempting to obtain desirable agricultural production outcomes (Anderson and Feder 2004). In practice, extension work tends to give priority to approaches to enhance production efficiency and create conditions to maximise output (Milestad et al. 2012).

It is important to recognise that, as agrarian transitions unfold, the goals and priorities of agricultural extension may also need to evolve (Maulu et al. 2021). On the local scale, agricultural extension contributes to disseminating knowledge and technologies as well as linking farmers with other actors in the rural economy (Gido et al. 2015). Specifically, extension facilitates the sharing and the uptake of information about new crop varieties and associated production and management practices towards the improvement of agrarian communities’ livelihood conditions. However, how an extension system operates depends largely on extension service delivery approaches, governance, capacity, as well as structures of extension in place (Maulu et al. 2021). Realising how these factors shape the operation of agricultural extension on the ground, it is essential to investigate how agricultural extension justifies its goals and mandates to effectively address multifaceted challenges, as well as obtain opportunities arising from agrarian transitions.

This paper focuses on how agricultural extension, while being triggered by the complex processes of agrarian transitions, ushers in new operational trajectories for change. The paper aims to shed light on how extension practices deviate from the conventional modes of operations to better align with the contemporary capitalist agricultural production and meet the emerging demands. By investigating the interface between agrarian transitions and agricultural extension operating under multiple drivers of change across the case study countries, this paper contributes to advancing the understanding of how agrarian transitions serve as a tipping point for a paradigm shift in extension. This shift aims to better address evolving needs, especially from farmers, and promote learning dynamics among stakeholders, including development agencies, extensionists, and the private sectors, as evidenced in the pluralistic agricultural extension models.

Research methods

Study contexts

A multiple case study approach was employed in this paper (Yin 2018), focusing on three countries in the LMB, namely Laos, Cambodia, and VietnamFootnote 2 (Fig. 1). The countries were selected for two main reasons. First, they have undergone similar agrarian transitions from subsistence-based to market-oriented economies, with agriculture as a key contributor to the national economies (FAO 2021). Second, they are geographically, climatically, economically, and politically connected with similar agricultural development policies (Nguyen et al. 2023a) and governed by the authoritarian regimes (Cosslett and Cosslett 2018; Cramb 2020). The selection of three case studies provides a broader understanding of how the changing nature of climate, development, and market forces play a role in the LMB, how these processes prompt agrarian transitions, demanding corresponding change in structures, agendas, and operations of agricultural extension at the local scale.

Fig. 1
figure 1

The map of selected case study countries in the LMB

Full size image

Located in the northernmost area of the LMB (see Fig. 1), Laos has tropical climate conditions heavily influenced by the Southeast monsoon. Among the selected case studies, Laos has the lowest population (Table 2). The agricultural and forestry sectors contribute 47% of the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Over 80% of the population is employed in these sectors (de Andrade Correa and Jansen 2022), with the majority (over 60%) residing in rural areas (OECD/FAO 2017). Although Laos is a landlocked country, it remains highly vulnerable to climate risks, including floods, droughts, landslides, and heatwaves. The rural populations, whose livelihoods depend largely on agriculture (Alexander et al. 2017), are particularly susceptible to climate-related events. Laos has a tropical monsoon climate, with the majority of its annual rainfall (approximately 90%) occurring during the wet season from May to October (Manivong and Cramb 2020). The annual temperature in the northern and eastern mountainous areas averages around 20oC, while in the plain areas, it tends to be higher, ranging from 25 to 27oC (ADB 2021a).

Cambodia has a population of over 16 million with an annual growth rate of 1.4%. Most Cambodian populations (nearly 80%) live in rural areas, making it the highest proportion among the three case study countries. These rural populations adopt agriculture as a key source of food and income (OECD/FAO 2017). In 2019, about 3 million people were employed in the agricultural sector, accounting for around 32% of the total labour force (ADB 2021b). About 23% of rural households do not own land, while an additional 15% own less than 0.5 hectare (ha), leading them to rely on agricultural wage labour for their livelihoods (World Bank 2017). Rice is the most dominant food crop of the country, with many locations devoted to various subsidiary annual crops, such as maize and cassava (ADB 2021b). Maize is typically cultivated twice per year, while cassava is planted only once annually. Geographically, rice farming concentrates mainly in the lowlands, while the uplands, particularly in the Northwest region, are dedicated to cassava and maize production (Touch et al. 2017). Additionally, tree crops, such as rubber, are cultivated on a large scale (plantations) in the northeast of Cambodia (Baird and Fox 2015). Like many other countries in Southeast Asia, Cambodia experiences a tropical monsoon climate. The wet season spans from May to October, with the highest rainfall occurring between September and October. The dry season lasts from November to April, with increased frequencies of drought and dry spells in recent years (Touch et al. 2017). Throughout the year, the country maintains average temperatures, varying from 28 to 32oC (Cosslett and Cosslett 2018).

Table 2 Overview of the case study countries
Full size table

Vietnam is located in the southernmost area of the LMB, which the VMD located in the southern part of the country. The region is home to nearly one-fifth of the country’s population (see Table 2). Agriculture is the mainstay of the national economy, contributing 50% of rice output and 95% of rice exports (VCCI 2020). Similar to its neighbouring countries (Laos and Cambodia), the VMD is influenced by the tropical monsoons, with similar weather conditions (Cosslett and Cosslett 2018). Recently, the delta has experienced disruptions of water flows due to altering transboundary environmental conditions, including the compounding impacts of climate change, such as prolonged droughts, and upstream hydropower dam operations (Hoang et al. 2019; Tran and Tortajada 2022). These stressors have profound effects on agricultural systems and agrarian communities who depend on natural resources for their livelihoods.

Data collection

The study employed a snowball sampling technique (Liamputtong 2013), with the selection of prominent professionals working on various aspects of agrarian studies and agricultural and rural development in Southeast Asia. Each expert respondent was asked to recommend others, who also have profound knowledge of the topics under study, to whom we reached out for further interviews. The recruitment of experts was aimed at ensuring a comprehensive understanding of the subject matter. They were selected based on their expertise, field experience, and scholarly contributions to the research themes, which encompass agrarian transitions, agricultural extension, farmers’ demands arising from agrarian transitions, knowledge transfer patterns, and agricultural and rural development. The experts are affiliated with a wide range of institutions (i.e. research, academic, and applied), both within and outside of the case study countries. By collaborating on research projects with partners in the case study countries, they acquire in-depth knowledge relevant to the topics of investigation.

Thirty-five experts were recruited for in-depth interviews in attempts to respond to the following questions: (1) “In your own work, how do you understand agricultural extension?”; (2) “What roles do agricultural extension play in addressing the challenges faced by farmers in the areas where you have worked?”; (3) “What have been the most important agricultural extension projects in this area?”; (4) “What are the main challenges faced by agricultural extension?”; and (5) “Who are the key actors who shape agricultural extension?”. The experts also shared their insights on a wide range of issues, including agrarian transitions, as well as relevant challenges to agricultural extension. Overall, experts’ reflections brought together critical insider-outsider perspectives, shedding light on specific strategies to advance agricultural extension and the expected role(s) of a new generation of agricultural extensionists in addressing evolving challenges and expectations in the wake of agrarian transitions.

Due to the effects of Covid-19 pandemics, all interviews were undertaken virtually using the Zoom platform. The co-authors took the initiative to contact the experts and assisted in arranging the interview appointments. The interviews took place between December 2021 and October 2022, and were conducted in English. Following the procedures for data collection in the first phase, the first author contacted experts based in the VMD for additional interviews in October 2023. Each interview lasted about one and a half hours. To ensure the accurate capturing of the discussions, the co-authors sought the experts’ consent for the interviews to be recorded.

We also conducted an extensive review of literature relevant to the study topics. This encompassed a thorough examination of journal articles, books, policy documents, and scientific reports focusing on agrarian transitions, agricultural extension, agriculture, and rural development taking place in the challenging contexts of the case study countries. The literature review provides a broader understanding of the research context while supporting the thematic analysis of the data. In particular, they contribute to complementing evidence sought from the primary data (i.e. expert interviews), as well as verifying, and corroborating the empirical results. Overall, the integrated analytical approach used in this study allows us to achieve a more robust and profound analysis of the data, while ensuring a thematic saturation to establish the representativeness of the findings (Lowe et al. 2018).

Data analysis

A hybrid approach that incorporates both inductive and deductive thematic analysis was utilised (Fereday and Muir-Cochrane 2006). This approach has been widely used in studies on agricultural and environmental management (Cusworth and Dodsworth 2021; Pacheco-Romero 2021). This analytical strategy allowed us to integrate data-driven and theory-driven coding methods, facilitating the identification of the overarching themes on the study topics. It also allowed us to gain a comprehensive understanding of and to profoundly interpret the data (Lochmiller 2021). The qualitative analysis involved the use of Neuman (2011)’s approach through the systematic processes of open coding, axial coding, and selective coding. These techniques assisted in organising the data into categories from which themes emerged. Several key themes emerged from the analysis included: agrarian transitions, agricultural extension, and challenges faced by extensionists. The analysis was implemented using NVivo software.

Results and discussion

Agrarian transitions across the case study countries

Our analysis of the qualitative data identifies two sets of drivers (known as external and internal drivers), which serve as the catalysts for agrarian transitions in the case study countries (Fig. 2). The external driver encompasses compounding impacts of infrastructural development (e.g. hydropower dams) and climate change (e.g. extended droughts), exposed by the recurring alterations of water regimes of the Mekong River and its tributaries, leading to shifts in agricultural production systems (Green and Baird 2016; Kem 2017; MARD 2022). Global and regional food markets stimulate the proliferation of commercialised agro-commodities in the LMB, such as cassava and maize (Green 2022a; Nguyen et al. 2023b; Ornetsmüller et al. 2018), and the export-oriented modes of agricultural production such as rice (McElwee et al. 2023). Agrarian transitions are also shaped by donor development agendas which aim to improve the quality of agricultural products and align the agricultural and rural development trajectories with their development interest through Good Agriculture Practice (GAP) standards such as GlobalGAP and others (Stuart et al. 2018). The internal driver includes the implementation of capitalist development policies in agriculture (e.g. agricultural modernisation) characterised by government’s shift towards the production of commercialised agro-commodities and greater investment in infrastructural development (e.g. transport routes) (Royal Government of Cambodia 2020); as well as access to local resources (MAFF 2015; MARD 2022).

From the case study analysis, these drivers are perceived to hold profound implications for agrarian transitions. In Cambodia, extreme climate events, such as droughts, posed challenges to farming systems, leading to change in agricultural production patterns (e.g. converting to conservation agriculture) (Montgomery et al. 2017; Touch et al. 2017). In the VMD, recurring water disruptions of the Mekong River due to extended droughts and operations of upstream hydropower dams have enabled change in farming systems to mitigate the impacts. At the national level, the Vietnamese government has pushed forward a strategic development agenda towards the commercialisation of high-quality agricultural products in order to meet global and regional market demands (MARD 2022). At the local level, farmers’ shift from the ‘quantity to quality’ production model offers space for the shift from traditional (output-oriented) to high value-oriented agro-commodities, where they can earn greater profits. Addressing the agrarian transitions in the VMD, an expert reported that:

Climate change and upstream hydropower operations contribute to agrarian transitions in the VMD. The Vietnamese government attempts to restructure crop systems and animal husbandry with a particular attention to quality- and value-oriented output…. In other words, they attempt to move from priority of food security towards market-based economy so as to enhance household income. (Interview 35)

Fig. 2
figure 2

Drivers of agrarian transitions and implications for agricultural extension in the case study countries

Full size image

Agrarian transitions– driven by the ongoing capitalist development in agriculture (i.e. agricultural modernisation) and associated land use change for commercialised agricultural production– share relatively similar impacts among the case study countries. These processes, contingent upon various contextual factors, could be realised (Baird et al. 2022). The globalisation allows national governments to attract corporate investments on a large scale, revealing opportunities to modernise and mechanise local agricultural systems. While making important contributions to changing the rural development landscapes, this process presents negative impacts on rural livelihoods, especially the poor (Tran 2019). As claimed by de Boon et al. (2022b), the legitimacy of a transitional pathway depends largely on the value-based, normative, and political judgements of those who are affected by it.

Agrarian transitions characterise labour exits from agriculture and out-migration, including internal and cross-border (Lawreniuk and Parsons 2020). For most of the rural poor, these form key adaptation strategies to sustain incomes and gain better life conditions (Sugden et al. 2022). This is evident in Laos and Cambodia, where the rural poor are inclined to migrate across borders in search of urban job opportunities in Thailand (Barney 2013; IOM 20162021). This is the case of Vietnam, where most of the rural poor in the VMD, faced by agricultural mechanisation, migrate to industrial and commercial cities such as Ho Chi Minh City and Binh Duong Province, where they can secure full-time employment (Tran 2019). There is evidence of inequality from these transitions as poor farmers are marginalised from agricultural and rural development policies due to their lack of access to land and other resources. Young people also seek to avert from hard work in agriculture and find a more modernised life in urban areas. Referring to the Cambodian context, an expert put that: “We have some farmers here that are in their 30s and 40s… But yes, it is an ageing population. Everyone wants to move to the city and be in air-conditioning and not be sweating out in a tropical field doing hard labour with not much return” (Interview 28). Staying back in rural areas means that they will be persistently trapped in precarious livelihood conditions (Gorman 2022; Rigg et al. 2016). While being seen as a push factor that explains the prevalent ‘exits from agriculture’ phenomenon (FAO 2021), outmigration has come to worsen the supply of labour in rural areas, especially during peak harvest seasons (Cramb et al. 2020).

Agrarian transitions, while contributing positively to the restructuring of rural and agricultural systems (i.e. agricultural modernisation) to accommodate the new climate and development contexts, are perceived to have detrimental effects on various household groups. In the VMD for example, better-off farmers (landholders) experienced difficulties in securing their income due to frequent volatility of the rice commodity market (Betcherman et al. 2021; Kien et al. 2020). In the same vein, cassava market volatility has put farmers in Cambodia and Laos under high risk (Beban and Gironde 2023; Nguyen et al. 2023b). Meanwhile, the rural poor seem unable to adapt to these changing contexts due to their perceived lack of resources (e.g. land, skills, knowledge, and financial capacity) (Mahanty and Milne 2016). Reflecting on market challenges faced by farmers in Cambodia, an expert noted: “The second key challenge is the problems faced by farmers to market. Completely exposed to the market, the volatility of price in the market with ups and downs, without really being able to control whatever they can, you know, because the price is a given. They are price takers; they are not price givers” (Interview 6). This remark is consistent with the ADB report that most Cambodian farmers conventionally sell their products to traders or middlemen after harvest, resulting in unexpectedly low returns (ADB 2021b).

The accelerating processes of agrarian transitions, while making a strong push for national governments to transform their rural and agricultural systems to keep pace with the modernising world, have come to pose challenges to agricultural extension systems. Salient evidence of challenges is revealed across the case study countries, which is directly linked to operational structure, capacity, and performance of agricultural extension. This begs a critical question concerning how and to what extent agricultural extension services can adequately address the changing nature of agrarian transitions which have occurred under the climate and development dynamics, while contributing to leveraging the agency of extensionists in response to growing demands at the local scale.

Perceived challenges in agricultural extension

Challenges constraining the efficient operation of agricultural extension in most Asian countries can be attributed to several reasons. Baig and Aldosari (2013) attributed the underperformance of public agricultural extension agencies (i.e. failures to make any significant impacts or positive changes) to their weak organisational structure, low participation of local farmers, lack of appreciation and incentives for extensionists, and gaps of coordination and communication among policy makers, researchers, extensionists and local farmers. These resonate with the case study countries, where agrarian transitions largely operate in a top-down fashion, aligning with pre-determined development agendas set by the national governments. In Cambodia for instance, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) promulgated an extension-oriented policy, demanding that national agricultural extension navigate “its strategy from a supply-driven extension-for-production approach to a demand-driven, extension-for-market, -competition, and -sustainability approach” (MAFF 2015, p. 3). Achieving these overarching goals, however, will put disproportionate pressures on extension agencies as to how they would be able to fully translate the spirit of such a policy into real-life practices. It was mainly attributed to: (1) centralised system structure and approach of extension– extension remains centrally planned by MAFF; (2) shortage of financial and human resources; and (3) incomplete extension service package (production-oriented) (FAO 2011; Kem 2017). This is the case in Laos, where the bureaucratic governance system remains predominant, which exerts a strong influence on how extension is operated on the ground. An expert working in Laos commented that:

At the national level, we’ve got an extension department. They have no line control down to the field, unless they are given a project to implement. They’re given a project to implement, they’ve got budget, and then it becomes like a giant patronage system, where they can pay the guys below them to actually do stuff that they want. (Interview 7)

In Vietnam, the extension system has gradually shifted from the dominant model-based approach to participatory, market- and demand-oriented models of extension, reckoned by the slogan ‘from state to market’ in the wake of Renovation (Đổi Mới) policies since the late 1980s (Friederichsen et al. 2013). Similar to Laos and Cambodia, the extension system is largely exercised in a top-down governance approach. Extension operations are subject to execute national and provincial development plans. As evidenced in the VMD, multiple constraints are portrayed through weak coordination and connections among extension entities (Nguyen and Tran 2017). In the view of these challenges, an expert noted:

Agricultural extension activities in the VMD are not well-coordinated. There exists much redundancy in ways extension is carried out by public extension agencies and companies. (Interview 35)

Our data brought to light entrenched challenges faced by agricultural extensionists in the case study countries. Major constraints were concerned with the lack of resources and local support. In the case of Laos, there is insufficient funding to cover essential expenses, such as travel costs (e.g. gasoline) or per diems for extensionists. These considerably hamper their engagements and commitment to working with farmers, thus limiting their ability to keep up with on-the-ground practices. An expert admitted that:

“There’s no funding for extension in Laos. The only extension activities are those that are funded by external projects. There is no regular budget that allows a system of extension to operate. (Interview 7)”.

Sharing a similar view, the other expert expressed his view of challenges extensionists in Cambodia have experienced, and how these put restrictions on their work:

I think they [extensionists] can’t reach out enough. I think what happens is that extension officers and the extension office itself: they’re very good, they’re very knowledgeable. But the thing is, they have few resources. They just can’t get it out. Some of them prefer to stay in the office, not to go out. (Interview 24)

Experts also expressed their concerns over the critical shortage of human resources in public extension agencies. This understaffed condition did not allow extensionists to reach out to farmers so that they can accommodate their needs. An expert claimed that:

They [extensionists] actually reach only a fraction of farmers… They have limited means. I’m not even sure it would be possible to go into more remote areas. It’s just like a financial constraint for them… So usually what they do is focus on a few lead farmers and a few groups, model farms, whatever. But it doesn’t mean that it’s going to spread out to the whole farmer community. (Interview 9)

The lack of trust from rural farmers to extensionists adds additional challenges to extension operations. In realities, while trust-building is an essential attribute to warranting successful extension (Buck and Alwang 2011), distrust tends to expand ‘understanding gaps’ between extensionists and farmers, which may hamper farmers from interacting with extensionists, whereby farmers can acquire extension knowledge. This disruption can be attributed to the ‘precarious extension’ phenomenon that appears to be common in agricultural extension. Reflecting on this issue in Cambodia, an expert revealed:

There is probably a certain level of lack of trust and confidence amongst farmers. Agricultural extension agents come in here with all really fancy ideas and new inputs and seeds and technologies, but they don’t understand the market situation… It was about a distrust of the government. I had multiple conversations with farmers. And that was their biggest concern. We’ve been here for decades, and they’ve come once. They don’t care. (Interview 19)

Our data revealed the two forms of challenges, defined as ‘challenges from above’ and ‘challenges from beneath’, that extensionists have grappled with. In the context of Cambodia, the former refers to the challenges associated with the obligations that extension agencies, such as General Directorate of Agriculture, undertake to fulfil the magnitude of responsibilities/tasks demanded by ministerial-level government officials. As perceived in most cases, government officials are politicians who lack technical practices and the contextual understanding of local extension. The latter is concerned with struggles encountered by senior extensionists in providing their staff with access to opportunities to acquire new knowledge as well as expanding outreach to local farmers. Addressing these challenges means that extension agencies need to serve as knowledge/innovation brokers in mediating decision-making processes from the central level while accommodating local demands to bring about desirable outcomes (Klerkx et al. 2012). An expert indicated that:

They [extensionists] haven’t had opportunities to travel and see different things… There’s always a gap between political masters of the Ministry and those with technical capability. So they have a challenge from above and a challenge from underneath. The challenge from above is that you’re often dealing with people with little understanding of technology, and probably quite dated understanding of farming experience…The challenge from underneath is helping their staff access training and opportunities. They’ve tried to shape up a system, but they just don’t have the capacity to reach out to farmers. (Interview 26)

Agrarian transitions engender new demands from farmers, necessitating immediate interventions and support from extensionists. This contributes to answering two important questions: (1) from the institutional perspective, how extensionists steer away from the ‘business-as-usual’ extension practices predominantly exercised in agricultural extension systems; and (2) from the practical perspective, how extensionists, given the lack of supporting resources yet burdened with high responsibilities, sustain their motives and commitment to extension work. These issues will be elaborated in the following section.

How agricultural extension responds to emerging needs

Agrarian transitions set a scene for the transformation of extension systems to deliver pertinent extension services to farming communities. These efforts have been translated into national government policies across the Mekong countries. In Cambodia for example, MAFF (2015, p. 3) highlights the role of extension agencies in supporting farmers through the slogan ‘extension service for better well-being.’ In our interview, an expert’s assertion: “Farmers’ lives are more than agriculture” (Interview 3) indicates a mismatch between the goals of extension (narrow) and farmers’ demands (wide-ranging). This points directly to the complexities associated with the evolving landscapes of agricultural extension in the Mekong region, where extensionists would need to upgrade their skills and capacity to take over more challenging extension work. The ongoing shift towards demand-driven agricultural extension in response to the changing pathways of climate change and development (Agriculture Extension Review 2019; MAFF 2015; MARD 2022) suggests that extensionists would need to engage more profoundly with farmers and provide as much support as needed. Farmers have diverse needs, with expectations to (1) gain greater access to technology, skills and knowledge; global and regional markets; and resources (e.g. land, credits, and agricultural inputs); and (2) enhanced income (Agriculture Extension Review 2019; Green 2022b). While the agrarian transitions create a tipping point for a shift away from ‘business-as-usual’ extension, which often centres on knowledge transfer (Sulaiman and Hall 2002), extensionists are expected to step out of their ‘comfort zones’ to deal with real-life situations. Efforts led by extensionists will contribute to securing farmers’ livelihoods and their well-being as demanded by national governments (MAFF 2015). An expert addressed this in the following:

If you [extensionists] want to really help people, you have an open mandate on even what you could call agricultural extension. Rice diseases are not farmers’ problems. It’s more on the human sphere. (Interview 3)

Experts identified several institutional challenges that extensionists are confronting with. These aspects are relatively similar across the case study countries. Conventionally, extension work is subject to achieving pre-determined objectives set by government extension agencies, which are predominantly exercised by the authoritarian governance approach. These create constraints that, to some extent, restrict extensionists’ capacity from thinking ‘out of the box’, but comply with the stated rules. Additionally, weak coordination between extension agencies and research institutes makes it hard to address the needs of agrarian communities, as evidenced in the case of Cambodia (Ke and Babu 2018). In the case of VMD, an expert claimed that:

I see our extension systems are too weak… Their functions narrowly limit within how many of trainings they provided to farmers. This evidence unveils the dominance of conventional extension practices, which cannot enhance farmers’ capacity in responding to climate change and other externalities. (Interview 34)

Experts asserted that farmers also encounter numerous challenges. More often, farmers seek extension solutions, which go beyond technical aspects of farming. Pressing demands from farmers mainly revolve around accessing capital, such as loans from banks or micro-finance institutions, for agricultural development, or improving capacity to sustain their livelihoods (Baird 2023; Guermond et al. 2023; Green 2022b). While acquiring new skills and knowledge is essential, addressing these disconnections requires extensionists to step into famers’ livelihood conditions and gain better understanding of their lives so as to deliver needed extension services. These insights resonate with Landini’s (2021) view that extensionists’ knowledge, skills, and competencies are crucial for successful extension. An expert put that:

You [farmers] don’t have the market for your commodity. How do you link your commodity to the value chain? Then the extension worker has to find where the regional market is. Where is the urban market, where is the global market? So extension workers have a role to play in terms of guiding the farmers to connect to the value chains. So that’s another role the extension worker has to play. (Interview 4)

In their new role, extensionists should act as facilitators and enablers, rather than as service providers (Benson and Jafry 2013). From the experts’ views, these signal a demand for extensionists to transform from ‘extension workers’ to ‘problem solvers.’ This should be aligned with the need to reinvigorate, redefine, and reinvent the conceptualisation and practice of agricultural extension to meet changing contexts (Ampt et al. 2015). An expert noted that:

The main lesson is that you [farmers] want an extension worker to be a problem solver, not a technology transfer person… They [extension workers] should be able to tap into the knowledge and bring the knowledge to the forefront of the farm and work jointly with farmers to solve the problem. (Interview 4)

Extension systems have become more pluralistic over time (Norton and Alwang 2020). Extension should move beyond the boundary of training and learning– it should take initiatives to address marketing issues and join hands in partnership with service providers and other related entities (Baig and Aldosari 2013). In this sense, pluralistic extension provides space for active engagement and learning among stakeholders including private sector, non-governmental organisations, and development agencies (Blum et al. 2020). In our case studies, the pluralistic extension paradigm is characterised by the networking and operations of extension learning platforms, where multiple stakeholders engaged in co-learning and co-producing innovative extension solutions. As evidenced, learning is the key ingredient in the pluralistic extension models where the stakeholders have opportunities to interact and strengthen their capacity. Concerning how these models operate on the ground, the experts commented:

We argue that people who are interested and involved in pluralistic extension including the private, public, NGOs, producer organisations come together. What the GFRAS [Global Forum for Rural Advisory Services] did is creating this kind of platform… to engage in policy, advocacy, to strengthen capacity development, and to promote networking and learning. (Interview 13)

We develop the MEL [Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning], a learning system at the regional level… For me, the actual extension is about engaging farmers or any stakeholders…. From an agronomic point of view, we would like to diversify as much as possible. (Interview 15)

Champion-led co-production of innovative agricultural extension models

Scientific and policy discourses in agricultural extension demonstrate the processes of development and implementation of agricultural innovations (Rockenbauch et al. 2019). Responding to challenges arising from agrarian transitions triggered the formation of social platforms, where relevant stakeholders engage in learning towards developing innovative agricultural solutions (Bhatta et al. 2017). From the bottom-up perspective, these evolving dynamics offer opportunities for catalysing innovative agricultural extension solutions.

Our case studies demonstrate the evolution of agricultural extension innovations that actively support on-the-ground extension work. They referred to the ‘corporate extension programs’ to demonstrate efforts invested by local stakeholders in advancing the contemporary agricultural extension systems. An exemplary case includes the development of innovative agricultural extension models, such as Metkasekor in Cambodia. The Metkasekor, termed as ‘farmers’ friend’ in Khmer, is a sustainable climate-smart extension service model. It focuses on opening the market for private sector investments in Conservation Agriculture and Sustainable Intensification (CASI) by disseminating and promoting extension services via government agents to smallholder farmers (CIRAD 2022). While there is empirical evidence on the development of the Metkasekor extension model in Cambodia, no such cases were reported in the other countries we studied.

The successful development of innovative extension models, such as the Metkasekor, illuminates the pivotal roles of ‘champions’ in spearheading the process. Here, the champions are identified as individuals from the private sector or development organisations, who have a stake in agricultural development. The example characterises the champions’ efforts in identifying bottlenecks existing in local agricultural extension systems, while building strategic partnerships with relevant institutions (i.e. Department of Extension, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DEAFF) and CIRAD) and individuals to develop extension solutions. While the role of champions in agricultural extension was prominent in Cambodia, similar cases were not reported in Laos and Vietnam. In the particular context of Cambodia, an expert highlighted that:

This is the extension model that I am excited about. He [the champion] does what we call demand creation… He invited manufacturers, service providers, farmers, all sorts of people in the value chain of conservation agriculture… He gathered the private sector… He created all demand creation meetings. (Interview 10)

The successful production of the Metkasekor extension model is the result of collective efforts among stakeholders in Cambodia. Here, the champions are seen as ‘agents of change’, who realised emerging opportunities to improve the capacity and performance of extension. Extension agencies across administrative levels are brought into the processes of extension development and operations, allowing them to take ownership of the model and collaborate with development partners and other stakeholders to enhance extension delivery. An expert noted that: “Metkasekor is the product of the government” (Interview 14). These engagements provide a pathway for the development of the pluralistic extension approach where the stakeholders can exert collective influence on agricultural development and extension policies. As an expert indicated that:

With MetKasekor, it is governance for me… It is a coordination, bringing different development partners that are supporting PDAFF [Provincial Department of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries]. For me, it’s a holistic model that. If it works, it will be something that Cambodia can be proud of. (Interview 14)

Study limitations

There were some limitations in this paper. First, it mainly encompassed the key drivers of agrarian transitions in relation to corresponding change in agricultural extension at the national level. As such, they did not delve into specific contexts of how these dynamics take place across geographical contexts (e.g. lowland versus uplands) within and across the LMB countries. Another limitation in this paper is the lack of a comparative analysis that investigates commercialised agro-commodity production policies (e.g. cassava, maize, and rice) across the case study countries. This limitation restricts our understanding of how extension operates in such domains of development. Future studies need to delve into this space, examining how enhanced extension performance paves pathways towards sustainable agricultural and rural development at the regional scale.

Conclusions

The Mekong case studies demonstrate how agrarian transitions are influenced by the interplay of multiple drivers in the region. It extends the understanding of how agrarian transitions stimulate emerging demands that agricultural extension needs to address. While these processes introduce complexities to agriculture and rural systems, they offer an opportunity for the Mekong countries to gradually shift away from conventional agricultural production towards commercialised production patterns. This shift holds the potential to bring higher revenue for the national economies and improve farmers’ income and well-being.

The paper highlights how agrarian transitions influence change in agricultural extension to better support local needs, especially from farmers. On the one hand, these processes rendered multi-faceted challenges that extensionists are grappling with while undertaking extension work. The challenges vary from the persistent lack of resources (e.g. financial support and incentives) to the erosion of extensionists’ motives and commitment to work. On the other hand, extensionists are struggling with growing demands from farmers, which often exceed extensionists’ expertise and capacity. These challenges, however, have urged them to hone their professional skills and transform themselves, from being ‘extension workers’ to ‘problem solvers,’ to better address the farmers’ needs.

Our paper highlights the pivotal role of the ‘champions’ in facilitating the co-production and implementation of agricultural extension models, such as the Metkasekor. The successful case of Metkasekor suggests how the pluralistic extension approach allows private, non-governmental organisations, and development agencies to engage in collaborative learning processes while developing agricultural extension solutions. Moving forwards, enhancing social relations in extension through legitimising the pluralistic approach will play an essential role in leveraging the potential capacity of agricultural extension. In a broader context, it helps enhance agricultural and rural development in the midst of agrarian transitions not only in the case study countries but also in other regions of the global South.