In need of more attention is the quality of soil. We have national laws for water and air quality, but a serious lack of knowledge of the trends in the quality of the thousands of soils that are the basis for production of food and fiber, and the quality, and the quantity, of water in each watershed. In the late sixties, when Associate Administrator Sladwin Young was retiring, Secretary Orville Freeman asked several, including Ken Grant and myself, to portray The Mission of the SCS in the next decade. Conservation has recently moved from the province of a few to the embrace of many. A new conservation concept that recognizes the crisis of both resource quantity and quality in the countryside calls for increased consideration of the total environment.
Conservation still begins on the land, with each individual acre.
The fundamentals that determine the success or failure of soil and water conservation have not been neglected. However, the interests of the users is now equal to the owners of resources. What would have been sufficient for yesterday is too little, too late for tomorrow for success and fame are fleeting. This prestigious Service has heavy demand for its skills. It has met changing needs with realism and vision, for SCS history has been one of progressive evolution.