We work with various community groups across Kenya, Uganda and as of the last quarter of 2021, we are establishing networks in Tanzania. These community groups supplement their incomes through engagement in the crafts industry. The groups’ age ranges from as young as 23 years old to over 70 years old including young mothers, widows and grandmothers. We also work with artisans who are a majorly men of similar age distribution.
The raw materials used are drawn from their natural environments and include sisal, palm/rattan, reed and palm. These materials are either used as they are in their natural colour tones, or dyed to produce various multi-coloured or earthy tones. As of 2022, we begun working with a new beading group. Given the role women play within most African households, they use weaving as an alternative source of income beyond dependence on rain-fed agriculture.
For the wood artisans, they use mango and olive wood harvested from regional and local plantations, as well as their own woodlots.
In Kenya, we work with sisal weavers from the Taita region in south eastern Kenya, and the Ukambani regions within central Kenya. They source their sisal either from markets during market days, or from their own community or household sisal plants. Palm baskets weavers are located in the highlands of Taita County.
Within Kajiado County, south of Nairobi, we work with two groups: beaders and the wood artisans.
In Uganda, we work with two groups located in the Fort Portal region as well as in Kampala. Though these groups, made up exclusively of women, make the same Ugandan products, the circumstances that motivate engagement within their groups vary. For the Kampala group, the weavers engage in basket weaving to earn alternative forms of income given employment opportunities are rare for the older generation living in the outskirts of Kampala. In Fort Portal, the majority of weavers are socially ostracized for various reasons. As such, supporting the businesses of both groups creates more social and financial agency to their members, improving the quality of their lives.
Beyond organizing such groups to produce quality volumes, we also seek avenues where weavers can learn and/or hone other life skills. Such include business management skills, basic financial literacy, new farming activities/technologies and complementary skills such as sewing and tailoring. These extra skills compliment their basket/wood carving /beading enterprises, further adapting to socio-economic changes.
In future we hope to expand to more meaningful partnerships with other stakeholders and have enough market to provide fulltime employment opportunities.