Subject and purpose of work: The aim of this article is to present selected aspects of agricultural advisory services in Poland as one of the most important cells of knowledge transfer influencing the development of agriculture and rural areas. Materials and methods: Based on the analysis of the available literature and existing legislative acts an attempt was made to discuss the changes that had occurred both in terms of the organization of agricultural extension in Poland, as well as in the substantive content dealt with by advisory services. Based on secondary sources the noticeable tendency of changes in the agricultural counselling system in Poland have also been defined. Results: In this paper special attention has been paid to the need of creating such an agricultural extension system in which all the institutions and organizations forming it would have conditions to develop effective forms of cooperation aimed at the development of rural areas. Conclusions: Since agricultural extension centres are not able to perform all the tasks imposed on them there appears a chance for the new entities, e.g. private consulting firms.