Society has become much more involved in determining how agriculture will be practiced. Taxpayers and consumers are as interested in the integrity of the environment and the aesthetics of the countryside as they are in assuring the domestic food supply. Farmers who say they have no further need of Extension are stuck in an old paradigm. In delivering educational programs to farmers, Extension has traditionally confined itself to the private accounting system of the market economy. It's now challenged to help farmers understand the more complex public accounting system.
Soil fertility offers a good example.
How much nitrogen fertilizer to use, in what form, and how and when to apply it, has usually hinged on profitability. If expected marginal returns provided a reasonable rate of return above marginal costs, the investment in additional fertilizer was considered sound. What was previously a straightforward topic of production agriculture has now become a public policy issue. Formulating Extension recommendations is much more complex when they're surrounded by public policy issues. In the early years of this century, it was easy to recognize the benefits of Extension educational programs to farmers, their families, and rural communities as human development in the national interest.