A young man eating coconut flesh. - - Agriculture Productivity of Subsistence Farmers, Western Samoa: TCP/SAM/6652. The Government of Western Samoa is adopting a policy to improve technical assistance to small farmers in order to increase their agricultural production. The Department of Agriculture, responsible for providing agricultural extension services to farmers, needs strengthening in several areas in order to function effectively. It is obtaining a loan from the Asian Development Bank to improve mobility for extension agents and to construct local offices and training facilities. The Government has requested assistance from the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) under the Technical Cooperation Programme to train extension personnel at all levels of the Department and to help establish the proper functioning of an information support unit. The objectives of the project are to train agricultural extension staff of the Department of Agriculture and to improve the training and extension support capacity of the Department's agricultural information and communication unit. It is expected that the project will contribute to the improvement of the agricultural extension service to small farmers and help increase agricultural productivity and income in the rural sector.