Join us for the 3rd Annual Foodapalooza, a special event celebrating Central Louisiana’s local food and farms! The event features a variety of learning and resource sharing opportunities, including a special keynote presentation by Kathlyn Terry, the executive director of Appalachian Sustainable Development, whose mission is to grow food, communities and opportunities to build a thriving Appalachia. Terry has been ASD's executive director since 2011, using ASD's broad experiences with education, economic development, and empowering people to make a difference in their own lives to develop farm, forestry, food access and youth development strategies in southwest Virginia and northeast Tennessee.

The event is free of charge. Foodapalooza begins at 8:30am with a morning Local Food Summit, featuring presentations and skill-building workshops.  Workshop topics are:

• Profitable Planting for Markets
• Farmers Markets Impact on Communities
• Strategies for Change: Local Government and Local Food
• Growing Profits: Connecting Farmers, Buyers, Citizens and Food Hubs
• Planting the Seed: How to Get Youth Interested in Gardening  
• Making Black Gold: Composting for Beginners
• Worming Your Way to a Healthy Garden: Worm Casting 101
• Sipping Your Own Suds: Introduction to Home Brewing

Local Food Summit presenters include:

• Patrice Kunesh, Deputy Under Secretary for USDA Rural Development
• Mark Cain, nationally-renowned organic farmer, owner of Dripping Springs Farm in Arkansas
• Good Food Project
• Louisiana Food Bank Association
• Red River Brewing Company
• And many others!

Following the Local Food Summit, Foodapalooza will feature locally-sourced menus at many of our region’s restaurants and afternoon local food and farm activities. Click on the individual Foodapalooza activities above, including the Local Foods Summit, to register for free for whichever part of the event you’d like to be a part of. We hope that you can join us all day on the 27th!

This year Foodapalooza will include a free seminar on record keeping for farmers, hosted by nationally renowned organic farmer Mark Cain. This seminar will be held at CLEDA on Thursday, February 26th from 5:30 to 7:00pm. To register for the seminar, and for more information, visit www.whybas.com.

And make sure to join other young and beginning farmers and advocates on Friday evening at the Young Farmers Happy Hour from 5:00 to 7:00pm at Finnegan's Wake in downtown Alexandria, hosted by the Louisiana Young Farmers Coalition. 

Along with the above activities, Foodapalooza is partnering with our region's farmers markets to offer special Foodapalooza events and incentives at each market. Stay updated on www.freshcentral.org for details on specific events and incentives hosted by our region's markets. 

For more information on the all of the activities and partners making Foodapalooza happen, visit www.freshcentral.org or the Central Louisiana Local Foods Initiative facebook page: www.facebook.com/cenlalocalfoods. If you have more questions, please call 318-441-3424 or email jdean@cenla.org.

 Foodapalooza is part of the Central Louisiana Local Foods Initiative, which is a Central Louisiana Economic Development Alliance-led program working toward creating a vibrant and healthy regional foods economy throughout Central Louisiana. The initiative is funded by a Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana Foundation Challenge Grant and The Rapides Foundation. Initiative partners include the Food Bank of Central Louisiana, the Louisiana Public Health Institute, MarketUmbrella, the Good Food Project, the Cane River Green Market, the Winn Farmers Market, and the Farmers and Artisans Market of Leesville.