This project builds on our successful partnership, established in 2015, to offer a comprehensive program of training, support, and land access for beginning WNC farmers and ranchers, through…

The Organic Growers School Inc. was awarded a $750,000 Project Grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture's Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program to provide training, technical assistance, and land access services to beginning farmers and ranchers in Western North Carolina through September 2024.

The Organic Growers School, Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy, and NC Farmlink will collectively offer a comprehensive suite of programs to support over 600 beginning farmers and ranchers. This includes the Organic Growers School's year-long Farm Beginnings training program and new Journeyperson advanced training, the Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy's farmer incubator and farmland conservation programs, and NC Farmlink's land matching services. The partnership aims to help beginning farmers establish resilient farm businesses, prioritize land access and tenure, and expand the delivery of these services to more rural and disadvantaged communities in the region.

This project builds on our successful partnership, established in 2015, to offer a comprehensive program of training, support, and land access for beginning WNC farmers and ranchers, through whole-farm production and business education, farmland linking, and land trust services. The farm pathways team includes the organic growers school (OGS), southern appalachian highlands conservancy (SAHC), and NC farmlink (ncfl, a program of ncsu extension). The partners received a bfrdp development grant in 2015, and a standard grant in 2016 to launch and lay the foundation for this innovative collaboration.collectively we will provide these additional services for beginning farmers to expand our audience and partnership: 1) build resilient farm businesses with targeted training, technical assistance, and mentoring for beginning farmers. 2) prioritize land access and farm transition, and support strategies for successful beginning farmer land tenure. 3) expand, enhance, update, and deliver farm pathways beginning farmer programs to a wider audience; including more rural farmers, veterans, limited resource and socially disadvantaged farmers. 4) facilitate farm pathways program replication to other areas of the country by designing, streamlining, administering, and distributing collective evaluations and measurable reports.while the impact of covid-19 has been devastating for our communities in uncountable ways, IT has not revealed anything new about the problems beginning farmers face. Rather, IT has served to exacerbate and amplify these pre-existing problems and shined a light on the cracks in our food system that make IT increasingly difficult for new and beginning farmers to succeed, in particular veterans, limited resource, and socially disadvantaged farmers.?many of the beginning farmers in the WNC region need support getting started, increasing adaptability, and staying viable. Over the past 5 years, with support from the bfrdp, the farm pathways team has provided training and support to over 2000 beginning farmers of which 45% are women, 30% are limited resource, 4% are disadvantaged populations, and 2% are veterans. We also know that the majority of beginning farmers in our region are underfunded, come from non-farming backgrounds, and struggle to find long term land tenure. In 2019, OGS conducted a comprehensive survey of local farmers to better understand the barriers to successful farming in NC. The top five concerns for farmers regarding their farm viability that emerged from this project included profitability, climate change, labor, changing regulations, and access to markets.although we've been successful in our efforts to date, we know from programmatic feedback and statistical data that we can amplify that success by paying closer attention to beginning farmers in years 3-10 of their farming careers, specifically helping to overcome the struggles new farmers face securing long term, affordable land access and profitability. We also knowwe need to increase access to beginning farmer training and support for more rural and disadvantaged communities in our region, and populations such as women, veterans, limited resource farmers, and black, indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) farmers. This ongoing strategic partnership provides much needed, high value resources for beginning farmers to create, run, and maintain successful, resilient farm enterprises throughout WNC. We will offer the following programs to provide a trajectory of support: 1) OGS offers farm beginnings® farmer training, a year-long comprehensive program (the only one of its kind in the southeast) to promote holistic, practical, whole-farm business, financial, and marketing education; mentoring and technical assistance to provide long-term, targeted, and famer-specific support; a new journeyperson: advanced-beginner farmer education program for farmers in years 3-10 designed to serve the beginning farmer from start-up to establishment. 2) SAHC provides their farmer incubator program which offers land, infrastructure, and equipment along with support, training, and coaching for beginning farmers; the farm production workshops series; and agricultural conservation easements and farmland acquisition services which assure long-term availability of affordable farmland for beginning farmers. 3) ncfl contributes land matching services, which link beginning farmers with farmland owners; one-on-one consultations for both landowners and farm seekers, including succession planning support. We will springboard from our existing partnership to acieheve these goals by adding additional strategic collaborators, building upon our extensive farmer training expertise, widening our farmer network, and increasing access to training and support for more beginning farmers in our region in order to establish a clear path to resilience, viability, and land access for our regional farming community. With a goal of serving more than 600 beginning farmers in the southern appalachians.