Inaugurating a workshop on `Policy framework for agricultural extension' here, the secretary proposed a demand-driven extension system where agricultural research bodies and extension workers would be reorganised to function as ``information providers.''

Calling for a "regionally differentiated national strategy" for providing extension services, Pande outlined an extension system in which farmers would pay user charges, to replace the top down approach which had covered only one in four farmers in the country over the last 50 years.

The national centre for crop forecasting would act as the source of information which could be provided through extension workers and even exclusive channels on Akashvani and Doordarshan, he said.

"Such a revamped system would need an estimated Rs 500 crore as kick-off money and another Rs 500 crore over the remaining three years of the Ninth Plan," he added.

Noting that the generalist prescriptions of the green revolution were no longer valid, additional secretary Sathi Nair said extension strategies should be geared to help farmers avail of market opportunities according to their social, economic and environmental conditions.