About AFI
From Research to Working Local Food Systems.
The American Farm Initiative grew from a practical question: why do so many promising local-food efforts struggle to become durable local food economies? AFI's answer is that production, farmer livelihoods, markets, and community institutions have to be built as parts of the same system.
Our Mission
Build Local Food Economies Around Farmers Who Can Succeed.
AFI helps communities develop networks of small farmers and connect them with buyers, institutions, training, infrastructure, and local partners. The goal is practical: stronger farmer livelihoods, more reliable local markets, greater community capacity, and more food produced and circulated closer to where people live.
Our Story
The Work Began With the Farmer.
AFI grew out of research and applied work on food systems, sustainability, and the barriers facing small-scale agriculture. Again and again, the same pattern appeared: communities could invest in land, gardens, facilities, food access, or individual growers without creating the market relationships and coordination needed to sustain them.
That insight changed the question. Instead of asking only how to grow more local food, AFI began asking how to create conditions in which farmers can succeed and buyers can purchase locally with confidence. Years of implementation in Ohio turned that question into a working model and continue to shape how AFI approaches new communities.
How AFI Is Organized
Different Functions.One Shared Purpose.
AFI's work spans education, farmer development, community implementation, system design, and the tools needed to coordinate production and markets. Those functions are carried through complementary organizations so that public-benefit work and practical implementation can reinforce one another.
AFI-Learns
The nonprofit arm focused on education, farmer development, community learning, partnership-building, and public-benefit implementation.
AFI-Builds
The implementation arm supporting farm and system design, infrastructure, operating systems, and the practical work required to move from planning to production.
You do not need to decide which AFI entity you need before contacting us.
Start with the problem; AFI will help identify the right path.
Founder
Kent "Kip" Curtis
AFI was founded by Kent "Kip" Curtis, an environmental historian at The Ohio State University whose work connects environmental history, food systems, agriculture, and applied sustainability. His research and field work focus on turning good ideas about sustainability and local food into systems that work economically and institutionally. That research produced the Microfarm Community Food Development System (MCFDS) — the operating model behind AFI's approach — which AFI holds under an exclusive license from the Ohio State Innovation Foundation.
Work With AFI
Where Do You Fit?
Local food systems need different people doing different things. AFI works with communities, farmers, buyers, institutions, funders, and implementation partners that want to strengthen the connections between local production and local markets.
Communities
Bring together growers, land, organizations, buyers, and community resources around a practical implementation strategy.
Farmers & Growers
Build production and business capacity and participate in coordinated market opportunities.
Buyers & Institutions
Develop more reliable pathways for purchasing from local farmers and grower networks.
Funders & Partners
Support farmer development, market building, infrastructure, food access, and the coordination that connects them.
Tell us what you are trying to accomplish and where the gaps seem to be. We'll start there.
