About Us
Samad Gardens Initiative LLC is a CT-based herb farm and garden education enterprise founded by Azeem Zakir Kareem and Sarah Rose Kareem. Samad offers ongoing education support for new gardeners and farmers with a focus on serving the BIPOC community. Educational offerings include an incubator farm and apprenticeship program at Auerfarm, ongoing classes on gardening, foraging, seed saving, self-sufficiency, regenerative growing techniques, and more.
Since its launch in 2020, Samad Gardens Initiative has delivered farm and garden trainings and presentations in partnership with, UCONN's Solid Ground Urban Farmer Training Program, Working Lands Alliance, CT NOFA, NOFA Mass, CT Resource Conservation and Development, New CT Farmer’s Alliance, Windsor Public Library, Windsor Adult Education, Hartford Public Library, Common Ground Urban Education Center & High School (New Haven), Keney Park Sustainability Project (Hartford), Green Village Initiative (Bridgeport), and more.
In addition to education, Samad's farm production provides medicinal herbs and fresh, organic produce to our community in partnership with the Liberated Land Cooperative, Mercado Popular, Distinctive Ideas, Connecticut Foodshare, and to other restaurants and community partners. We sell our herbal teas, spices, and seasonal produce at various markets throughout the state including the Ellington Farmers Market, Coventry Farmer’s Market, Windsor Farmer’s Market, and Blue Back Farmer’s Market.
Samad Gardens Initiative has a new webstore featuring all our seasonal tea blends and herbs for women’s health, cold, flu & allergy support, stress relief, respiratory health, and more. Shop with us!
Meet The Team
Sarah Rose
Co-founder of Samad Gardens Initiative, Sarah Rose is an organic herb and vegetable farmer, educator and herbalist with a passion for food justice. Sarah Rose is passionate about bridging the access gap to BIPOC farmers and prospective farmers in our community through providing mentorship, apprenticeship and educational opportunities at Auerfarm, a 4-H Farm and Educational facility in Bloomfield, CT. She draws from four years of intensive organic vegetable farming experience at Holcomb Farm (Granby), a yearlong intensive at the Institute of Sustainable Nutrition (Granby) three years of urban farming experience in Hartford, CT, and is currently in her second year farming at Auerfarm (Bloomfield). As a farmer who has leased five plots of land in five different towns over the last three years, she is passionate about land access for new and beginning farmers. She has presented at various farming conferences, workshops and events throughout the state including with the New CT Farmer’s Alliance (NCTFA), UCONN, CT NOFA, NOFA Mass, Keney Park Sustainabilty Project, Working Lands Alliance, CT Resource Conservation and Development, and more.
Sarah Rose is co-faciltator of the Herb Farmer’s Circle (through NCTFA), which supports new and existing herb growers who intend to sell their products to the community - at any scale. She loves to inspire and build community with new farmers in our state to collectively bring the change we want to see in our food system.
Azeem
Co-founder of Samad Gardens Initiative, Azeem is a Black and Indigenous farmer, mindset coach, and advocate for farmers of color nationwide. Well-versed in psychology, Black history, and scripture, he speaks to the day-to-day realities that people of color face in reclaiming the knowledge, skills, and resources needed to become independent. His mission is to see the rise of a new generation of empowered BIPOC growers with the mindset to do for self and community.
Azeem also facilitates the BIPOC Farmer Affinity Circle, a project of the New CT Farmer’s Alliance, is a facilitator of the “Access To Information and Education” and Main Working Group member of the CT Department of Agriculture’s Diversity, Equity & Inclusion in Agriculture (DEI) movement, and a steering committee member of the CT Farm To School Collaborative.