Directions for Personnel Management of Agricultural Extension Services in Korea

농촌지도사업과 지도인력관리의 방향

Poitical demand for decentralization trends in Korea has led the government to plan to localize its agricultural extension system by changing the status of 6,696 extension personnel stationed at the provincial and county level from central government status to local government status as of January 1997. However, serious drawbacks of lowered morale of extension personnel and the financial burden of local governments has not yet been debated extensively for effective personnel management. Some of the findings that emerged from both the analytical and empirical research show the dangers of decentralization such as an increase in disparities, jeopardizing stability, and undermining efficiency. These problems should be considered along with the culture, tradition, and Koreans' attitude towards central and local government. The dangers of decentralization of agricultural extension services in Korea may cause serious problems in allocative efficiency because of a mismatch between available resources and promised expenditures, and in production efficiency because of unproven cost-effective provisions of local governments. It is accepted that the central government can invest more in technology, research, development, promotion and innovation in the agricultural sector. However, changing the status of extension personnel from central government to local government status may lead the best people to leave, lower morale, shake the sense of public service, break networks, and sacrifice investment in research, development and extension. In deciding the future directions for personnel management of agricultural extension services in Korea, maintaining or reinforcing the existing national status of extension personnel should be considered along with a reflection of the basic characteristics of agricultural extension services, linkages of research and extension, the financial burden of local government, specialization of extension personnel, unnecessary duplication of investment among local governments, possible national supports to agricultural research and development, and extension under the WTO systems.