Industrial agriculture has
disconnected us from life itself.
Local family farms bring life back to the table.
Our Mission
Blue Ridge Foodshed Fund
provides grants and patient capital to
support food-system stakeholders working together to build a self-sustaining local food economy centered around small family farms.
Why?
Local food systems rooted in small-scale family farms have the power to transform entire communities by enhancing health and wellbeing, circulating economic wealth within the community, restoring natural ecosystems, and ensuring regional food security and resilience.
We see a Southern Blue Ridge ecoregion where our farmers, neighbors, land and economy are thriving and our community is truly food sovereign.
How?
By infusing our local food system with grants and patient capital, rather than extractive investments, we’re developing a truly regenerative economic model that unites food-system stakeholders and keeps capital flowing within our regional foodshed.
Through an innovative bioregional financing approach, we bring funding and other resources to an ecosystem of grassroots initiatives in the areas of food production, aggregation, storage, processing, and distribution ~ supporting the local heroes in our food system to focus more on their unique passions and expertise.
With a commitment to transparency and collaboration, we are on a mission to to localize our region’s food supply to the greatest extent in the shortest time possible.
Our Role
Integrate
STAKEHOLDERS IN SYNERGY
We create the conditions for collaboration, coordination, and collective impact that no single organization could achieve alone. Aligned with living systems principles, we hold the vision of the whole while supporting the success of each part.
Invest
DIVERSE FUNDING FLOWS
Transitioning away from
dependence on government and
charitable funding into a self-sustaining,
resilient food economy through
a wide variety of aligned regional
and global funding sources.
Innovate
BIOREGIONAL PROTOTYPING
We nurture relationships of trust that form
the connective tissue between funders and community-based initiatives in our foodshed.
We also cultivate relationships with foodsheds outside our region to share best practices and address gaps in our seasonal food supplies.
Interweave
TRUSTED RELATIONSHIPS
We introduce and fund promising
innovations in areas like farming,
food systems, and technology ~
prototyping approaches that
demonstrate transformative impact
and can be adapted by other regions.
Focused regionally, connected globally
Blue Ridge Foodshed is honored to be one of 22 bioregional organizing teams from North, South and Central America and Hawai'i invited to participate in the first-ever 2025 BioFi Cultivator, a very special incubator program facilitated by the BioFi Project.
The BioFi Project, a fiscally sponsored initiative of The Buckminster Fuller Institute, is devoted to the decentralization of financial resource governance, the cultivation of project portfolios for systemic change, and the transition to regenerative economies.
Our Partners
A living foodshed is rooted in a mutually supportive network of organizations who share a dedication to the vibrancy of our regional food supply. We are honored to call these remarkable organizations our friends and collaborators.
Let’s grow something together
Questions? Feedback? Want to explore ways to support each other? We’d love to hear from you!
Image credit: Wild East Farm ~ Marion, NC
Fill out this form or click the button below to send an email instead. We will get back to you within 1-2 business days.
Header image: Bearwallow Valley Farms ~ Edneyville, NC
Circle images: Wild East Farm ~ Marion, NC