The Taproot Story
Taproot is a women-owned consulting firm specializing in economic and community development, working with the lens of diversity, equity and inclusion. Originally founded in 2019 by Susan Pavlin and Sagdrina Jalal, Taproot grew out of 20 years’ combined experience of establishing and leading multiple for-profit and nonprofit organizations in the South. Our primary focus has been shifting power to communities, and building sustainable food systems rooted in community, culture, and resilience.
Particularly in the South, business as usual means operating within the historical legacy structures of the South that support disparities in wealth and opportunity. Taproot was created with the commitment to dismantle old ways and forge new, equitable approaches to building communities and economies.
Taproot’s work focuses on leveraging organization and project success by providing services like strategic and operational planning, informed policy design and engagement, and grant writing and facilitation. At Taproot, equity is centered at the core of everything we do. We work alongside communities and engage across sectors to create more sustainable systems that work for everyone.
About the Founders
Susan Pavlin
Susan Pavlin brings ideas to life. With degrees from Vanderbilt University and University of Illinois College of Law, combined with a wealth of experience in law, philanthropy, entrepreneurship, and advocacy, Susan has a proven track record of turning visions into reality.
In 2008, Susan began exploring the connections between sustainable agriculture and the survivors of war and genocide that had recently arrived to start new lives in her community. Women from East Africa, families from Burma and many others sought opportunities to grow healthy food for their families. She became a founder of Global Growers in Atlanta, a non profit that connects families to agriculture land, education and markets. She then established The Common Market Southeast as Founding Director in 2015, in order to connect sustainable family farmers to the institutions and communities seeking to purchase good local food.
Susan’s subsequent work at Merrill Lynch focused on impact investing, ESG investments, and the measurement of impact metrics. She practiced law early in her career with Paul, Hastings, focusing on international law and migration. Susan is well versed in building sound organizational structures, creating detailed, actionable funding strategies, and understands how law expresses our conception of social and economic justice. Susan specializes in rural and urban economic development in the Southeast through the lens of food systems, equity, culture and entrepreneurship.
Susan is a member of the Institute of Georgia Environmental Leadership’s 2018 class and Les Dames D’Escoffier Atlanta. She currently serves as an advisor to the Reinvestment Fund’s National Fund Manager for the Healthy Food Financing Initiative, and as a Board Member for Global Growers. Recently, she was a member of the American Heart Association’s Healthier Diet and Business Committee.
Sagdrina Jalal
At the beginning of 2020, Co-founder Sagdrina Jalal took a full-time position with a consulting client, Center for Civic Innovation. She has gone on to be an incredibly impactful force in Atlanta as Senior Director of Community Innovation. In addition to her time at Taproot, she was also the founding executive director of Georgia Farmers Market Association (2013), elected board member for the National Farmers Market Coalition, a 2018 Well-Being Impact Area Advisor for the Community Foundation of Atlanta, and an advisor for Tuskegee University’s Organic Farming Project, creating impact across the state in communities large and small. Although Sagdrina is no longer with the Taproot team, the expertise she invested in our founding helped form who we are today.
Press
Building an Equitable Food System: America’s Healthy Food Financing Initiative & other Tools for Increasing Food Access
Click to Read (Saporta Report, 2021)