This symposium will highlight the current trends and examples of extension education practices for smallholder farmers that are working in some of the most undeveloped areas of the world. The hope is that ideas could be generated for how the public and private sectors could work more closely together to improve productivity through extension education. What forms of communication are likely to succeed? How have barriers to disseminating information been overcome? How have field diagnosis and subsequent management practices to improve productivity been successfully linked? Will extension education in these places look like extension education in North America?