The Natural Resources Conservation Service recently celebrated 90 years of protecting soil health and serving farmers to do so. Aubrey Bettencourt is the NRCS Chief and says connecting with farmers is something they talk about a lot.
“We’ve got to meet our farmers where they are and, more importantly, meet them where they’re going. We are at such a critical moment in agriculture, I think, where this is make or break for our society in terms of the investment we make in the 2% of the population that feeds, clothes and fuels the other 98%.”
Bettencourt has challenged her colleagues to think about how NRCS can meet the needs of farmers in 2025 while staying true to its principles.
“One on one, technical assistance is still a core value of what NRCS does and continues to do, as well as the financial assistance that comes with that, investing in certain practices so that farmers can make these investments on farm, increase their productivity resources that they need to do that, as well as supporting other conservation priorities that we have across the landscape.”
She says science-based conservation is the basis for all they do.
“We still have a wonderful science center and division within NRCS, and I think that’s going to become an even bigger part of what we’re doing, not just the basics of SNOTEL and Soil Sciences and soil health, which is our core mission, and really at our heart is the soil, but also looking forward as we deal with digital farming and automation. What are the technologies that our farmers are going to need and we need to help them get from pilot to scale we need to get these things affordable and on the landscape so that they can continue to do what they do best.”