On a sunny December morning, Western Lombard points to a black walnut tree.
It’s one of many native crops that grow on his farm in Millfield, which Lombard believes produce some underrated fruits: acorns and native nuts. “You can roast them. You can actually press them for … a culinary oil. You can make nut butters,” he said. “Anything you can do with traditional nuts.”
But there’s still one major challenge to selling them: the nuts have to be processed by hand.
According to Lombard, removing the thick shells is a labor of love. To produce just a few gallons of hickory nut milk can take him hours.
“Because there's not a huge industry around them, people haven't invested in developing the machinery to efficiently process them,” he said.
Now, a $100,000 grant from the Appalachia Regional Food Business Center will allow him to tackle that challenge. With the help of the grant, Lombard will build a processing facility food businesses around the region can one day use.
He’s co-founder of Rising Appalachia, one of 12 organizations in Ohio that will benefit from the grant. But after millions in funding for USDA programs was canceled by the Trump Administration earlier this year, this will be the grant’s first and only round of funding.
Grant program canceled after USDA funding freeze
Across seven Appalachian states, 56 food-related businesses will receive $3.53 million in grants as part of ARFBC’s business builder sub-award program. The awards will help support small food producers and projects that build capacity in local food systems.
In Cleveland, grant recipient Brooke Kahl will create new opportunities for small farmers with a neighborhood farm stop, where she will sell local foods on consignment.
Others are investing in food-related businesses, like grant recipient Irene Kim Chin. She’ll use the funds to take her Korean-Appalachian food start-up, Hei Hei, to the next level.
This year she’ll be able to hire the manpower needed to build her inventory and expand her sales. It’s a boost Chin wasn’t sure she would see until a few months ago.
“I just gave up hope on ever seeing any of that money,” she said.
That’s because USDA funding for the program behind the grants, the Appalachia Regional Food Business Center, was frozen when the Trump administration took office.
It was one of 12 food business centers around the country created in 2023 to strengthen local food systems after the disruptions experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic.
At its peak, the Appalachian center, led by nonprofit Rural Action, included 18 partner organizations and 86 employees.
The USDA announced in July it planned to cancel the regional business center program entirely, which was slated to continue until 2028.
But Chin and other recipients learned they would still receive grants in September, after some centers negotiated to protect the already promised awards.
“As a center that got a modified termination, we were able to have focused but limited ability to support the 56 recipients over the next year,” said Director of the ARFBC Paul Freedman.
Recipients will have until May to spend the grant funds, with technical support from the ARFBC.
Regional center created new opportunities
According to Freedman, the program was designed to address critical issues facing local food producers, like a lack of processing facilities and market opportunities.
Leslie Schaller is a program director at ACEnet, an organization focused on economic development that partnered with the center.
She said the program allowed organizations like ACEnet to increase their capacity and provided the opportunity to collaborate at a regional level.
“We have the skills, we have the expertise, we have the passion to make our communities more economically healthy,” she said. “But oftentimes we don't have … the resources in place to be able to do that.”
Kahl, the Cleveland-based grant recipient, has spent most of her career researching food systems.
She says localizing them is more sustainable, more nutritious and creates economic opportunities for the region.
“We're keeping those dollars to transport the food, to grow the food, to buy the food from a grocery store in a regional economy, and so there's more opportunity to develop jobs,” she said.
Kahl said she was disappointed to see the regional center shut down so soon.
“It feels like such a waste of resources that went into the planning and strategy of it all,” she said.
But those involved in the center’s work said even as it comes to an end, they remain hopeful.
“We ain't giving up on local,” said Schaller. “The work is not going to stop. We just might not be able to accelerate or meet the demand to the same level if we had three more years of regional food business center funding.”