Our Mission
Our Work
SAAFON’s work is grounded in farmer organizing, cultivating connection between farmers, and investing directly into sustainable farms. Through the spaces we hold and programs we offer, we are propagating Black agrarian cultural values and practices. By centering Black farmers, we are visioning towards an agrarian future in which thriving Black farms are honored as the cornerstone of their communities.
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Hear From Our Farmers
“Our farm has grown into a space to wholly nurture people and build relationships between earth, self, and one another and it’s done by weaving the philosophy of “ubuntu” throughout all we do. We think of this kind of sustainable farming, not as a new trend, but as an enduring and relevant one to our local food systems. Fueled by a passion for becoming positive agents of change, we believe together, within community, we can provide good food to all, including the most vulnerable among us. Farming and sharing our harvests with family, friends and neighbors strengthens our universal bonds. It breaks down barriers, connects our humanity and allows us to become better versions of ourselves.”
Keisha Cameron, Grayson, GA
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Hear From Our Farmers
“As a child I was out here, on my ancestral land, cleaning field peas with my great-grandmother,” he says. “And when you got to do all those things as a child, and then get to come back and do them as an adult—I’m stoked and excited. I ask the ancestors what they want. I try to commune with nature as much as possible.”
Matthew Raiford, Brunswick, GA
JOIN OUR NETWORK
Our Farmer Network is made up of Black farmers in the Southeastern U.S. and U.S. Virgin Islands who practice ecologically sustainable production methods. The farmers in our network are not only nurturing communities through food, but are integrating ancestral practices in their work and operations, and are facilitating programming and offerings that are enriching in spirit, and get to the heart of their communities’ needs.
Join UsHow To Get Involved
Connect With Us
Reweaving our relationship with U.S. Virgin Islands farmers has been a priority as part of our commitment to strengthening kinship among U.S. island and mainland growers and producers. Since 2010, SAAFON has actively created spaces in the Caribbean region that hold the thread of how our ancestors supported generations of families through practices that centered honor and care of the land. This year we realized our vision to invest deeper in farmer exchanges and wisdom sharing particularly crucial for Island and coastal farmers who are frontline responders and resilience leaders in the face of a steadily changing climate.
In January, we welcomed USVI Field Organizer Jael Paul, a mother, farmer, educator and chef based in St. Croix. She has been instrumental in connecting with SAAFON members in the Caribbean and informing our regional strategy development by hosting farmer listening sessions and exchange events on Island and in the states. In February we sponsored and attended the Virgin Islands Good Food Coalition’s Island Food Systems Summit in St. Croix, a generative space for farmers and advocates from across the U.S. Caribbean, including St. Thomas, St. John, Puerto Rico, and beyond, to identify and address community strategies toward food sovereignty.
The summer and fall brought opportunities for more on-island conversations. SAAFON hosted farmer-centered visioning around solidarity and partnership, followed by our fourth year of sponsorship and support of Sejah Farms’ Bush Cook Chef Cook festival, a vibrant, 3-day community celebration centering St. Croix student youth and adult chefs. The annual event is always an energetic punctuation of solidarity with Island farmers’ food security and sovereignty advocacy and awareness.
Deeply rooted in the legacies of our founders and legacy members who envisioned systemic change through meaningful connections among Black farmers across the diaspora guide the unfolding of the Caribbean Initiative. In the words of our island kin, “The water doesn’t separate us — it connects us.”
#SAAFON #BlackFarmingHistoryCulture #CaribbeanInitiative #FoodSovereignty
A HEARTFELT THANK YOU AND GRATITUDE for the 40 Farmers and land stewards from Georgia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina and Mississippi who pulled up to @boggsrurallifecenter on the weekend of October 11th, to help in post-Hurricane Helene recovery efforts. The storm’s impact on Keysville, Waynesboro, Augusta, and Burke County pivoted our best-laid Agrarian Revival Fest plans from booths to boots. Community partners @earthboundbuilding @b_d_f_c and #persimmoncollectivefund led the farmer brigade with chainsaws, rakes, shovels and a skidsteer, to clear tons of fallen tree trunks, limbs, and debris, as well as to rebuild a severed hoophouse.
Elder farmers, including Sam and Loretta Adderson of @addersonsfreshproduce and Wiley and Lynn Brown of Browns Place Farm, came through to support the efforts – which went deep into the afternoon - with the refreshment of their presence and pallets of water for the workers and guests. Augusta chef Ms. Carolyn Henry’s The STOP Food Truck, provided a hot and fresh meal, sourced from local organic farmers, and attendees also enjoyed a hands-on tincture and tea making demonstration by Keisha Cameron of @highhogfarm and Christine Miller of Beloved Birth Village.
SAAFON gives thanks for the time spent elevating the legacy of our gracious host Boggs, a historic Black land-based institution founded in 1906. With the entrance driveway now cleared, the Boggs Board and land stewards, including Mr. Alton and @Tianna Neal of @starlitroots can access the site for ongoing strategic planning and partnership development, to include resuming annual community events, festivals, and produce markets.
We appreciate donor @earthboundbuilding @b_d_f_c and #persimmoncollectivefund for helping us shift our focus our resources to supporting the local community, and @georgiaorganics @foodwellalliance helping to support getting farmers to Keysville for the brigade. Be on the lookout for more information about how you can support the continued recovery of our farmer families in the region.
#RootingInOurPractices #AgrarianRevivalFest2024 #SAAFONGrows #BoggsRuralLifeCenter #BlackAgrarianism #OrganicAgriculture #SETOPP #HurricaneHelene
Given Hurricane Helene’s vast impact across the Southeastern region, and specifically in Keysville, Burke County, and the Greater CSRA, SAAFON has decided to pivot our inaugural Agrarian Revival Fest: Rooting in Our Practices next Saturday. While the festival is no longer a public event, SAAFON and sister organizations Earth-Bound Building Cooperative, Black Dirt Farm Collective and Persimmon Collective Fund are hosting a skilled farmer brigade to support response and recovery efforts for farmers and families at @BoggsRuralLifeCenter and in the surrounding area. If you’ve already registered for the event, stay tuned for updates. If you haven’t, please understand our razor focus on addressing specific farmer needs like tarping, hoophouse restoration, tree and debris removal, and similar tasks.
SAAFON farmer-members should expect an email call for labor. Skilled farmers and land stewards – you know who you are – PULL UP! If you’re in ATL and want to ride the provided bus down, use the link in the bio to reserve a seat.
And of course, if you’re in the local and surrounding area of Keysville, come on out and join us for food, supplies, and to let us know what your needs are.
On behalf of our Board, staff, and community partners, we extend our deepest sympathy and compassion to all affected in the region, and particularly our farmers in the CSRA who were preparing to host the festival. Our team is eager to pull up and help in every way possible.
A big thanks to @earthboundbuilding @b_d_f_c #persimmoncollectivefund for throwing down with us to shift our focus on the ground and resources to support the local community around @BoggsRuralLifeCenter. And thanks @georgiaorganics & @foodwellalliance for being willing to redirect their event sponsorship funds to this emergent need to get our farmers to Keysville for the brigade!
At the heart of Black agrarianism is creating a sustainable future for children who are learning by example to embody a communal legacy of being in right relationship to the land. Skillful youth educators and SAAFON members Joy Lindsey of Grounded Roots Farms in Rocky Mount, NC, and Tony Gayles of Littlefoot Farms in Maysville, GA, will feature at Agrarian Revival Festival, on Saturday, October 12th at the Boggs Rural Life Center in Keysville, GA.
Mama Joy is a farmer, florist, imaginative teacher and mother of four young children whom she engages actively in her land stewardship. She will be teaching young festival participants how to build a terrarium, and how to create seed balls.
Tony Gayles, is a farmer and educator who worked for ten years in New York City public schools before starting Littlefoot Farm – his work centers Black youth across North Georgia, exposing them to the connection between natural science and land stewardship. At Agrarian Revival Fest, he will lead an activity for children to explore the process of seedsaving.
Through experiential learning, children not only build technical skills, but also develop sensory connections to land-based practices that we hope will inspire them to continue in the legacy of elders and ancestors who employed sustainable practices to care for themselves and their communities.
Have you registered your family for the festival and the roundtrip bus ride to Boggs from Atlanta? Please RSVP so we know how many children will be enjoying the activities designed to guide them into healthy relationships with the land.
Children are not just inheritors of our traditions, but active participants in helping SAAFON farmers build sustainable, thriving Black communities.
#RootingInOurPractices #AgrarianRevivalFest2024 #SAAFONGrows #BoggsRuralLifeCenter #BlackAgrarianism #organicagriculture #setopp
Black Agrarianism invites us to honor the land-based lifeways we’ve practiced, and that have sustained our communities over time. At Agrarian Revival Fest: Rooting in Our Practices, we are excited to have two demonstrations offered by farmer members of our network that showcase the beauty in our cultural and material traditions.
Keisha Cameron, of High Hog Farm in Grayson, Georgia will provide insight from her perspective as a farmer and shepherdess, cultural worker, and community educator who has cultivated rich and generative space for the exploration of Black agrarian heritage and its connection to fiber, natural dye, and textiles. She will demo natural dye techniques with a focus on indigo - attendees will be invited to dye bandanas and see for themselves the magic of this powerful alchemy.
IvoRi Schley of Afro Agriculture in Atlanta, Georgia, will provide a demo and skillshare on basketry. As a farmer, geographer, fiber artist, and environmental educator, IvoRi works to meaningfully connect youth and elders to nature and the agrarian arts, through educational experiences that are rooted in a love of the Earth. Using kudzu, a perennial vine abundant in Georgia, IvoRi will teach attendees how to use this bountiful plant to weave a basket, demonstrating the ways our traditions connect to what the has land provided.
We invite you to come to Agrarian Revival Fest on October 12, 2024 to see Keisha and IvoRi showcase their work, and to learn more about our collective cultural inheritance. To register, go to the link in our bio!
#RootingInOurPractices #SAAFONGrows #AgrarianRevivalFest2024 #BlackAgrarianism #highhogfarms #afroagriculture #Afroagriculture #sustainableagriculture #Setopp
