About

In fall 2019, the donor and RSF’s philanthropic services leadership team began to engage in a design process that would extend and deepen RSF’s shared gifting circle model. The donor was inspired by what they saw as strengths in the model: a place-based strategy, an emphasis on general operating support, and the ability of the participating organizations to grant to each other, supporting a regional or thematic ecosystem of partners. The donor also believed more robust grantmaking models, which strive to meaningfully disrupt traditional power dynamics in philanthropy and operate over longer time frames, are both possible and needed.

The design of the fund was grounded in the assertion that the food economy, anchored by Black Farmers, would serve as a powerful site for community wealth building and well-being. It was also decided that funding would be geographically focused in order to maximize impact. Recognizing that Southern Black communities have historically received a disproportionately small fraction of philanthropic resources, Mississippi and Alabama were proposed as the initial region. This area of the U.S., in which under-investment is the historical norm, was recognized for its rich resources that could be leveraged for impact, including and most importantly a long history of self-help organizing, cooperative development and social justice movement building.

SBFCLF emerged as a conduit for putting financial resources into the hands of leaders dedicated to catalyzing the region’s rich Black agrarian heritage and culture. Six organizations were invited and agreed to participate in the collaborative governance of the fund. The initial kick-off meeting was held in December of 2020. In 2021 the Fund Advisory Committee established a process and strategy (link) and began making grants (link).