This book covers many aspects that must be considered in developing extension programmes for sustainable agriculture, such as learning about soils and pest management, whole farm planning and the relevance of sustainability indicators, as well as teaching and learning techniques. It clearly identifies the importance of considering the economic, ecological and social dimensions of sustainability in agriculture together, combined with a need for research rigour in developing recommendations. Most chapters draw on experience in the United States, referring to well-established public extension programmes that can be reshaped. This is less relevant to readers in Europe where extension activities are largely privatized. Whilst the need to include consumers in this new ‘social’ contract is recognized, the ideas about how this could be achieved remain vague, and some chapters cover their subject rather too narrowly, for example, the lack of reference to animal health and clean grazing in the chapter about grazing. However, this is more than compensated by some real ‘gems’, such as an excellent description of a concept of eco-literacy (p. 40) or the challenges of integrating the economic and environmental dimensions in whole farm planning (p. 95 onwards) or of those faced by global agriculture in the 21^st century (p. 312). The book is well written in accessible language and referenced extensively, and therefore meets its own challenge in being relevant both to the generalist and the specialist, and to readers practically involved with farming as well as high level educators including professors.