In 2003 the economic, social and environmental impacts of five areas of research and extension where NSW Agriculture has made significant investments were evaluated. These investment areas included net feed efficiency in beef cattle; the management of temperate weeds in temperate pastures; conservation farming in the northern NSW cropping zone; wheat breeding in NSW; and extension in water use efficient technologies. The benefit cost analyses were conducted over the period from 1980 to 2020. For these five project areas NSW Agriculture invested $114m, including some support from industry. The industry returns totalled $1311m giving an average benefit-cost ratio of 11.5, ranging from 4.5 to 22.2.