The purpose of this grant is to provide funding to assist ASAP in its efforts to help local farmers organize, scale-up production, and increase the competitiveness of their products. The project will further develop and expand use of the Appalachian Grown branding effort in the far western and northwestern areas of North Carolina and will assist a number of famer and community-based groups that are coming together to promote the sale of local foods. This approach builds on ASAP’s existing brand and mitigates the redundancy of multiple brands. Activities will target farmer and community groups with marketing support and training and technical assistance with the goal of increasing farm profitability and investment in local food enterprises.