ASAP Connections

For more than 20 years, ASAP has focused on building vital community connections that help local farms thrive, link farmers to markets and supporters, and build healthy communities through connections to local food.  When you support ASAP, you help strengthen local food systems across the region and support our ability to share what we’ve learned with other communities across the nation.

Make a donation today to support our work. Thank you from all of us at ASAP!

Join us for our 2019 Business of Farming Conference, Saturday, February 23 at the AB Tech Conference Center in Asheville, NC. Spend the day learning and networking with farmers from across the region, and gain tools and strategies for improving your farm business. The Business of Farming Conference features business, marketing, and management workshops led by regional professionals and innovative farmers, a Grower-Buyer Meeting, individual consulting with business and agency experts, exhibitor hall, and locally sourced meals. The Business of Farming Conference is for beginning and established farmers, and those seriously considering farming as a profession.

Learn more about the conference and register by February 1 to save with our early bird discount.

ASAP’s Local Food Research Center has a new report: The Growth and Transition of Sustainable Production Practices in WNC. The report explores changes in the growing practices of local farmers from 2008 to 2016. We find that over this time period more farmers produced food for local markets using sustainable production practices; non-certified organic was the most commonly used practice. Find out more by reading the full report.

A hands-on conference for practitioners, researchers, and influencers to empower the practice of healthcare to support healthy eating. Sign up to get updates about future Healthy Eating in Practice programs at www.healthyeatinginpractice.org.

ASAP’s Local Food Research Center has a new report entitled “The End of Tobacco and the Rise of Local Food in Western North Carolina.” For nearly a century farming in Western North Carolina revolved around tobacco. Rows of burley tobacco were commonplace throughout the region, and for generations farmers relied on this cash crop each season. That all changed with the passage of the tobacco buyout in 2004. This report finds that the region has all but lost tobacco but local food has emerged as a promising new direction for mountain farmers.