The Marigold Fund for Unincorporated California is a participatory grantmaking fund formed through 10 years of strategic organizing by agroecology practitioners and farmworker community service providers looking to seed a new chapter in California agriculture. The Marigold Fund prioritizes agroecological land stewardship by farmworkers, small-scale farmers, and Tribes. It works to repair the harm wreaked by California agriculture by investing in the least-resourced communities while implementing climate solutions that honor local ecological wisdom and improve community health.

Deeply rural unincorporated communities, particularly those in the Central Valley of California, are often impoverished areas structurally excluded from the capital and political representation needed to participate in natural resource governance, such as soil and water management. The Marigold Fund specifically supports these rural settlements and Tribes to advance local strategies that advance healthy soil, clean air, safe drinking water, and rural livelihoods in their communities.

Offering both capacity building and operational financing, the Marigold Fund supports community-led approaches to land management such as composting, small-scale farming and gardening, community greening, and nature-based climate solutions for groundwater sustainability. By supporting projects proposed and implemented by community residents living in unincorporated communities, The Marigold Fund is advancing a new vision for natural resource stewardship envisioned by those who work the land. The Fund seeks to grow the economic viability of these projects over time.