In this blog, Alagu Niranjan draws a unique comparison between the education systems of agriculture and medicine and critiques the gaps in agricultural education.
CONTEXT
Has agriculture become just another science degree? This question compelled me to examine what has gone wrong in our discipline as a whole. The problem does not lie with farmers, nor with the complexity of agricultural systems, but begins much earlier—within our universities, our curricula, and our pedagogy.
Agriculture is fundamentally a practical discipline that produces practitioners, not merely generates knowledge, but applies it in real-world situations. Agricultural graduates are expected to advise farmers to keep their farms both healthy and wealthy. In other words, we are not meant to be skilled labourers on farms/organisations; we are meant to be advisors, practitioners, and problem solvers. Serving farmers is implicit in the very name of our degree. Yet the uncomfortable question remains: do we really serve farmers?
In reality, most agricultural professionals serve governments, corporations, companies, and organisations that work with or for farmers. In doing so, we often become intermediaries—passing on information, products, or services—rather than practitioners of agriculture. Whether we are truly practising agriculture or merely transmitting knowledge is a critical distinction that we rarely address.
To understand this failure, it is helpful to compare agriculture with another practising discipline that carries significant responsibility: medicine. Medical sciences operate under strict professional, ethical, and regulatory frameworks because their practice directly affects human lives. Agriculture, despite dealing with livelihoods, food security, environmental sustainability, and national economies, has not developed an equivalent professional seriousness or rigour. The contrast between medical and agricultural training exposes deep structural weaknesses in our discipline.
The table below summarises the key structural differences between agricultural and medical education.
Comparison between Medical and Agricultural Training
| Theme | Dimension | Medicine (MBBS) | Agriculture (B.Sc. Agri) |
| I. Disciplinary Nature & Regulation | Disciplinary status | Regulated professional practice | Applied science with limited regulation |
| Risk & accountability | High risk, strict public accountability | Lower immediate risk, limited accountability | |
| Regulatory oversight | Strong national & international bodies | Weak or inconsistent oversight | |
| Licensing to practice | Mandatory | Generally absent | |
| Global standardization | High | Low | |
| II. Educational Philosophy & Curriculum | Training goal | Practice-ready professionals | Broadly educated graduates |
| Curriculum philosophy | Competency-based, outcome-driven | Content-based, knowledge-driven | |
| Curriculum structure | Integrated (horizontal & vertical) | Subject-wise, compartmentalised | |
| Professional identity formation | Strong and early | Weak or delayed | |
| III. Teaching–Learning Environment & Methods | Learning environment | Hospitals, clinics, skills labs | Classrooms, labs, university farms |
| Early practice exposure | From early years | Usually late in the program | |
| Nature of practicals | Real cases, supervised responsibility | Demonstrations, limited responsibility | |
| Teaching methods | Case-based, problem-based | Lecture-centred | |
| Problem-solving focus | Central | Secondary | |
| Team-based learning | Integral | Minimal | |
| IV. Supervision, Assessment & Feedback | Supervision & feedback | Continuous, structured | Limited, irregular |
| Assessment philosophy | Ability to perform safely | Knowledge retention | |
| Practical assessment | Structured (Objective Structured Practical Examination – OSPE) | Mostly unstructured | |
| Workplace-based assessment | Mandatory | Rare | |
| Logbooks/portfolios | Compulsory | Optional or absent | |
| V. Internship, Ethics & Professional Development | Internship | Mandatory, supervised, rotational | Variable |
| Ethics & safety training | Core and assessed | Peripheral | |
| Continuing Professional Development (CPD) culture | Mandatory lifelong learning | Optional | |
| Graduation requirement | Demonstrated competence | Credit completion | |
| Practice readiness at graduation | High | Variable |
DISCIPLINARY NATURE AND PROFESSIONAL REGULATION
Medicine is a regulated professional practice with clear boundaries, licensing requirements, and strong national and international oversight. Risk and accountability are explicit; errors have consequences. A medical graduate cannot practice without a license, and incompetence is publicly unacceptable.
Agriculture, in contrast, is treated largely as an applied science with limited regulation. In India, there is no mandatory licensing to practice as an agricultural advisor. Accountability for poor advice is minimal, even though the consequences, such as crop failure, farmer indebtedness, environmental degradation, or food safety risks, can be severe. The absence of regulatory oversight has lowered professional standards and weakened practitioners’ sense of responsibility. When no one is accountable, professionalism becomes optional.
EDUCATIONAL PHILOSOPHY AND CURRICULUM DESIGN
Medical education is unapologetically practice-driven. Its primary goal is to produce graduates who are ready to practice safely and effectively. The curriculum is competency-based and outcome-driven, designed around what a graduate must be able to do, not merely what they must know. Integration across subjects and early professional identity formation are central features.
Agricultural education, however, remains largely content-based. Curricula are compartmentalised into subjects—soil science, agronomy, agricultural engineering, entomology, extension, economics, etc.—and are often taught in isolation. The goal is broad exposure rather than demonstrated competence. Students graduate having studied agriculture, but not necessarily having learned how to diagnose problems, manage uncertainty, or make responsible decisions in real farming contexts. Professional identity as an agricultural practitioner is weak or delayed, if it forms at all.
TEACHING–LEARNING ENVIRONMENT AND METHODS
Medical students learn in hospitals, clinics, and skills laboratories where real problems, real patients, and real consequences dominate the learning process. From early years, they are exposed to practice under supervision. Problem-solving is not an add-on; it is the core of learning.
Agricultural students, by contrast, are largely confined to classrooms, laboratories, and university farms. Practical sessions are often demonstrations rather than participatory experiences. Exposure to real farmers and real farm problems is limited and usually comes late in the program. Teaching remains lecture-centred, and problem-solving is treated as secondary to theoretical knowledge. Team-based learning, so critical in medical practice, is minimal in agricultural training.
SUPERVISION, ASSESSMENT, AND FEEDBACK
Assessment reveals what a discipline truly values. Medicine assesses the ability to perform safely under supervision. Continuous feedback, structured practical examinations, workplace-based assessments, and compulsory logbooks ensure that students demonstrate competence before graduation.
Agriculture largely assesses knowledge retention. Practical assessments are often unstructured, feedback is limited, and workplace-based evaluation is rare. Logbooks don’t even exist. Graduation is based on credit completion rather than proof of readiness for practice. As a result, competence varies widely among graduates.
INTERNSHIP, ETHICS, AND PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
In medicine, an internship is mandatory, supervised, and rotational. Ethics, patient safety, and communication skills are core components of training and are formally assessed. Continuing professional development is compulsory throughout a medical career.
In agriculture, internships are variable, inconsistent, and poorly supervised. Ethics and safety training are peripheral, despite their importance in advising farmers and managing environmental risks. Continuing professional development remains optional, reinforcing the idea that learning ends at graduation.
LESSONS FOR AGRICULTURAL SCIENCES
The purpose of comparing agriculture with medicine is not to mindlessly copy medical education, but to learn from its professional mindset. Medicine recognises that practice carries responsibility, risk, and ethical obligation. Agriculture must reclaim this same identity.
Farmers do not just need information brokers or product sales agents; they need competent, ethical, and accountable practitioners. Until agricultural education shifts from content delivery to competence development, from institutional comfort to field-based responsibility, and from vague service claims to measurable accountability, agriculture will continue to produce graduates who know about farming but are not prepared to practice it.
Agriculture has not become “just another science degree” by accident; it has been shaped that way by our training systems and professional complacency. Medical sciences demonstrate that an alternative is possible. Whether agriculture is willing to accept this challenge will determine not only the profession’s future but also the well-being of farmers and the food systems we claim to serve.
Dr D. Alagu Niranjan is a Research and Knowledge Management Officer with the Centre for Research on Innovation and Science Policy (CRISP), Hyderabad, India. He can be reached at: alaguniranjan@crispindia.org.
“This AESA blog offers a refreshing perspective on the subject. The analysis and presentation—particularly the comparison between two professions in terms of scope, outlook, regulatory mechanisms, and training—are both engaging and thought-provoking.
One notable point of divergence that stood out is the issue of remuneration. In medical practice, income tends to be relatively fixed or at least more assured. In contrast, agriculture operates under far more variable and unpredictable conditions. Agricultural outcomes are deeply influenced by personal, local, social, economic, political, ecological, and global factors. Farmers constantly navigate shifting market forces, climate variability, policy changes, and ecological uncertainties—most of which are beyond their control.
Medical practice, on the other hand, is largely case-based and individualized, with both patients and practitioners operating within comparatively structured and regulated systems.
Overall, I sincerely thank the author and AESA for encouraging readers to “open the cap of a different thinking cup” and reflect from a broader perspective”.
Dear Dr. Alagu Niranjan, compliments to you on an engaging and thought-provoking blog. The comparison between medicine and agriculture education deserves far deeper examination and, indeed, a serious and urgent public debate.
Both medicine and agriculture are disciplines grounded in knowledge and skill. However, while medical education places strong and structured emphasis on clinical skill development, agricultural education often falls short in cultivating practical competencies. It is skill that builds competence, and competence that instils the confidence required to pursue a profession with conviction.
It is therefore unsurprising that a large proportion of agriculture graduates opt for higher studies—not solely out of academic interest or a desire to become researchers and teachers, but often as a pathway away from direct engagement with villages, farmers, and farming itself. Obviosly, this has had most telling impact on the Rural Advisory Service. When graduates lack practical confidence, the profession loses its immediate relevance.
Unless State Agricultural Universities (SAUs) fundamentally reorient agricultural education toward producing skilled, field-ready professionals, they risk gradual irrelevance. More importantly, they risk transforming agriculture enthusiasts into reluctant professionals.
The issue extends beyond curriculum reform. Until about a decade ago, many faculty members and students came from farming backgrounds, bringing with them experiential knowledge and practical exposure. The noticeable decline in such representation further underscores the urgency of institutionalizing “learning by doing” within agricultural education.
If agriculture is to remain both a science and a profession of purpose, skill development must move from the margins to the center of its educational framework.
The catchy caption made me read the blog critically and I would like to reflect on the issues raised in the blog.
At the outset, I congratulate Alagu Niranjan for the excellent blog, attempting to compare medical and agricultural education.
Though theoretically, such a comparison holds good, practically many concerns and field related issues affect its relevance.
Niranjan has made a comparison on five thematic dimensions, which I consider as relevant and objective. However, there could be further
refinements possible. I am happy that our New Gen professionals are seriously thinking on developing professionalism in agriculture, which
needs to be appreciated and encouraged.
Though I agree to most of his views, I flag the following for further fruitful discourse.
1. Anyone can get involved in agriculture, need not be trained. But in the medical profession, only trained persons with a license can
only get involved in treatment protocols.
2. The structural, functional and socio-cultural differences between medical education and agricultural education need to be factored in.
3. There are a lot of differences noticed between agriculture as ‘taught’ and ‘practiced’, referring to farmers and their field problems, not covered
in the syllabus and course curriculum. In medical education, I don’t think such problems exist.
4. Skill development of agricultural professionals is very important for competency building, which needs to be given thrust.
5. Continued Professional Development as done for medical professionals must be made mandatory of agricultural professionals also.
I feel the debate on improving professionalism of agricultural graduates may continue …….