ASAPROSAR's mission is to empower the poor. ASAPROSAR listens to each community's needs, identifies leaders, and trains these leaders in the areas of health, nutrition, family planning, child development, the environment and sustainable agriculture. The leaders then educate their communities. ASAPROSAR also offers small loans to groups of entrepreneurs, most of them women, and is a leading provider of eye care for low income people all over the country.

ASAPROSAR began in the 1970s with Salvadoran doctor Vicky Guzmán's innovative training of rural health promoters. After a hiatus during the civil war, the organization has grown to serve more than 90,000 people in western El Salvador.