EN
During the period of reorganization of agricultural advisory system in 1991, the advisory staff were verified and advisory system was collectivized through forming collective councils of advisory service. As the result of the verification, the number of advisory staff decreased by more than 40%. In the structure of employment of advisory staff 2.6% are the managing personnel, 24.8% are institutional (trade) experts and 72.6% are local advisors. Women make 51.2% of the employed advisory staff. The structure of education of advisory personnel has improved consideably, as 63.3% of the staff employed in agricultural advisory centres have university education. There are particularly many university educated workers amongst institutional experts (87.1%), while amongst the country household experts there are only 31.3% of university educated workers. The local advisory personnel clearly emphasize that the main aim of their work out of town is to modernize family farms and to adapt them to the conditions of market economy (78.4% of answers). Institutional experts main purpose are the activities which tend to improvement of farmers’ efficiency of farming. Local advisory staff spend 70% of their working time to carry on their activities - 45% of time is spent on individual advisory services and 25% of the time is spent on group and collective advisory services. There is a need to increase the range and efficiency of the group and collective advisory activities.