The paper reviews the literature on the characteristics and impact of opinion leaders on the diffusion of new knowledge, concluding that there is no clear evidence on whether opinion leaders are more effective if they are similar in socioeconomic attributes to the other farmers rather than superior to would be followers. A multivariate analysis of the changes in integrated pest management knowledge in Indonesia among follower farmers over the period 1991-98 indicates that opinion leaders who are superior to followers, but not excessively so, are more effective in transmitting knowledge. Excessive socioeconomic distance is shown to reduce the effectiveness of diffusion. The paper then derives operational implications of the empirical results.

A joint FAO and World Bank study which shows how the farming systems approach can be used to identify priorities for the reduction of hunger and poverty in the main farming systems of the six major developing regions of the world.

Nearly two billion people depend on hundreds of millions of smallholder farmers for food security. Yet, these farmers' lives also hang in the balance due to their extreme vulnerability to the risks of soil degradation and depletion, soil exhaustion, climate change, and numerous biotic and abiotic stresses. Soil Management of Smallholder Agriculture

At the same time, many other smallholders are successfully intensifying and succeeding as farm businesses, often in combination with diversification into off-farm sources of income.