Africa
Burkina Faso
Atelier de Formation et de Promotion des Artisans
In 1996, Ten Thousand Villages began purchasing handmade crafts from artisans in Burkina Faso, with the assistance and coordination of master artisan Sissao Hamidou. In the years following, MCC Burkina Faso, a relief, development and peace agency of the North American Mennonite and Brethren in Christ churches, played a central role in purchases from these artisans by transferring payments and assisting the group. By 2013, the artisan group organized itself into a more formal entity called “Atelier de Formation et de Promotion des Artisans.” Mr. Hamidou continues to manage Ten Thousand Villages’ orders for this group and the artisans are the same individuals that Ten Thousand Villages has been purchasing from for over a decade. With the group’s advances, Ten Thousand Villages began writing orders directly to this association.
© Ten Thousand Villages
Cameroon
Prescraft
The Presbyterian Handicraft Centre, known as Prescraft, is based in northwest Cameroon. Men and women artisans produce traditional West African handicrafts, working at three rural production centers and earning a good income based on piece work. Some artisans combine handicraft production at home with farming or trading. They use the money raised from craft sales to pay for clothing, health care and housing, as well as their children’s education. Prescraft provides employment for close to 130 artisans, as well as some 260 home-based artisans. Prescraft goals include encouraging self-reliance, minimizing rural exodus to cities and preserving indigenous arts and crafts.
© Ten Thousand Villages
Ghana
All Pure Nature Ventures
All Pure Nature Ventures is a privately held enterprise producing and marketing personal care products made from shea butter, an indigenous Ghanaian natural resource for body care. Founder Gladys Commey has established a development project in the northern region of Ghana in which a group of women harvest and process the shea nuts for butter. With a small group of employees, Commey manufactures All Pure Nature’s personal care products in Accra. She works with four groups of artisans in four different villages outside of Accra who make the packaging for her products. Sale of their raw shea butter provides a valuable source of income for the producers in the north. For the staff in Accra, employment with All Pure Nature also provides health benefits and assistance with their education fees.
© Ten Thousand Villages
Dan Beaded Handicraft
Dan Beaded Handicraft, based in Dumasi-Krobo, Ghana, specializes in metal and bead work. Most of the artisans are from the local community. Dan Beaded Handicraft was established in 1989 by Dan Tey Doku and his wife, Janet Teye, as a carpentry, joinery, bead-making and metalwork shop. Now, specializing in bead and metal work, the group produces metal and recycled glass bead home decor products such as candleholders, plate stands, towel racks, recycled glass bead fashion accessories and jewelry. Dan Beaded Handicraft has received training and support through the West Africa Trade Hub (WATH), a program of USAID that works with a range of small to mid-size businesses in West Africa. WATH's goal is to help facilitate trade in the international market for businesses in this region.
©Ten Thousand Villages
Divine Chocolate
The Kuapa Kokoo cooperative was created in 1993 when cocoa farmers in Ghana united to negotiate better prices for their cocoa and empower small farmers. Kuapa Kokoo now represents 45,000 cocoa farmers and has a stake in the first farmer-owned chocolate company in the world, Divine Chocolate Limited. The company, which started as the Day Chocolate Company, launched its first bar of Divine chocolate in 1998. This innovative model of farmer ownership was born from a partnership between the Kuapa Kokoo cooperative, Twin Trading, the Body Shop and Comic Relief. The Body Shop later donated all of its shares to the Kuapa Kokoo cooperative. Because of this unique partnership model, the cocoa farmers in Ghana participate directly in the decisions made by the organization and share in any potential profits. Kuapa's cocoa growers also receive above-market Fair Trade premiums for their cocoa beans which are used to fund community development projects like wells and schools. Kuapa Kokoo's motto is pa pa paa - which means the best of the best in the local Twi language.
© SERRV
Trade Aid Integrated
The Upper East region is the most impoverished area of Ghana, with 90% of the people living below the poverty line. Trade Aid Integrated is a non-profit organization created to find employment for the rural poor of northern Ghana. Generations of women from 17 different communities near Bolgatonga, the provincial capital, have learned to weave the distinctive and brightly-colored bolga baskets, using sturdy elephant grass, which grows along rivers and streams, and other natural fibers. More than 250 basket makers benefit from the services offered by Trade Aid including professional training, marketing outlets, raw material accessibility, and management skills.
Through fair trade, members of Trade Aid are paid a fair price for each basket and additional funds are invested in the community. Trade Aid has constructed shelters that protect weavers and their supplies from the weather. The shelters also provide a space for gathering when weather is bad, and for basket weavers to learn from each other, build community and generate unity.
© SERRV
Unique Batik
All of Unique Batik's products are handmade by fairly paid artisans. We think happy hands make better products and a better world. Regular orders from Unique Batik create choices and opportunities. Artisans know in advance how much they will earn and can plan for the future. The security of a good job is one of the best ways to ensure that families are healthy, have food on the table and kids are in school.
In Ghana, everyone seems to have an eye for vivid color and ideas for repurposing materials into fun things. Our products use age-old batik techniques, recycled glass and handmade brass details in updated combinations. Although there is plenty of creativity to go around, new products can still be hard to market. Regular orders, design feedback and fair prices from Unique Batik give artisans access to a wider market and more opportunities.
Go forth with good karma on your body knowing that an artisan family thanks you.
© Unique Batik
Kenya
Afrika Pamoja
Afrika Pamoja is a Kenyan social entrepreneurial project where young women who learned to make handicrafts can earn a living. These young women joined the Teenage Mothers and Girls Association of Kenya to learn vocational skills and chose craft-making from the available training programs including secretarial, hair-dressing, and tailoring. The women carry on the long tradition of making jewelry from recycled materials, an income-generating vocation for many men and women in the Kisumu, Kenya area.
In addition to supporting the sales of products the young women of TEMAK make, Afrika Pamoja also acts as a marketing organization for other craftspeople in Western Kenya.
© Global Crafts
Bombolulu Workshops
Bombolulu Workshops is located in Mombasa, Kenya, and works with up to 110 disabled men and women artisans to help them overcome their physical limitations and empower them economically and socially to become fully integrated members of their communities.
Bombolulu started in 1969 as a rehabilitation project sponsored by the Association for the Physically Disabled of Kenya. Bombolulu Workshops provides artisans with training in jewelry making, screen printing, wood carving and crafting to provide them with a dignified way of earning an income. They also provide housing and assistance with medical care. Bombolulu's motto is 'Disability is not Inability.'
© SERRV
Don Bosco Printing Press
The Don Bosco Printing Press, named after its Salesian founder, aims to contribute to the social and economic growth of young people, particularly in the Makuyu area of Kenya. Salesians are a Roman Catholic religious order founded in the 19th century with a concern for youth. The Don Bosco Press has created a professional center with two-year courses to provide technical and graphic design training. Youth participating in the program come from needy families, and receive a diploma at completion.
© Ten Thousand Villages
Jedando African Handicrafts
Working with more than 100 individual carvers in Machakos, Kenya, Jedando Modern Handicrafts markets African handicrafts primarily made of wood and bone worldwide. Carving is a tradition in Kenya with the children learning the craft from their parents. Carved by hand using only rudimentary hand tools, olive wood bowls, salad serving sets, and animal-shaped napkin rings take shape from pieces of olive wood, mahogany, and mpingo, or "African Ebony".
An integral part of the organization's function is to educate the craftspeople on the need for reforestation to enable the products to be available for years to come and offer a sustainable income for generations. While wood carving provides the major income for many in the Machakos area, other craftspeople earn a living by further enhancing the products including painting the napkin rings and carving discarded animal bone for the handles of salad serving sets. Often the bone is "batiked" by placing wax on the white bone and dipping the bone a dark brown/black dye, resulting in patterns African mud cloth designs.
© Global Crafts
KICK Trading Ltd.
KICK Trading (Kisumu Innovation Centre of Kenya) is a registered company with artisans, staff and supporters holding shares. KICK Trading is based in Kisumu, a city of 800,000 with high unemployment and underemployment. Kisumu has a high incidence of HIV/AIDS, which affects many artisans and their families. KICK Trading focuses on creating employment and income generation opportunities for Kenyan artisans, working with disadvantaged artisans, and connecting artisans to global markets on fair trade terms. Artisans hold 20 percent of the company’s shares. Additional benefits include loans for school fees or emergencies, training, counseling, and product development and design help and access to global markets. Some 70 percent of products are made from recycled material, including recycled wire, sheet metal, wrought iron, water hyacinth rope, papyrus, soda cans and waste paper.
© Ten Thousand Villages
Kisac Fair Trade Ltd.
Kisac Fair Trade Ltd. is an artisan-based group made up of members, employees and artisans. The group's goals include the following: 1) improve the standard of living of members and participating artisans through the production and sale of soapstone carvings; 2) improve the social, economic and environmental well-being of marginalized communities in the local area through active participation in community-based projects; 3) operate an equitable business that involves the sharing of profits between members, employees and artisans; and 4) promote fair trade and social justice within the community. Throughout its existence, Kisac has generated income for its members, artisans and employees.
© Ten Thousand Villages
Namayiana
Namayiana is an informal cooperative of Maasai women artisans who create traditional Maasai beaded items. Namayiana means “We are blessed” in Maasai. When asked how long the Maasai have been doing beadwork they answer, “Since the first Maasai was born.” These Maasai artisans live about an hour from Nairobi in the Ngong Hills. Namayiana has provided many benefits to the more than 100 families involved. Income from craft sales has helped to provide food, clothing and school fees for the artisans’ families. The women work independently for Namayiana, both at home and at the workshop.
Namayiana was founded in 1990 when two Maasai handicraft groups merged. The group was initially sponsored by Mennonite Central Committee Kenya, and is now independent.
© Ten Thousand Villages
Nyabigena Soapstone Carvers
Kisii, a city in western Kenya, is surrounded by soapstone quarries and is well-known both for the quality of its soapstone and the skill of its carvers. Nyamarambe, a small village near Kisii, is the home of the 120-member Nyabigena Soapstone Carvers Cooperative. This civic-minded group has been providing work for its members while also giving back to its community. A source of great pride for the cooperative is the Nyabigena Mixed Day Academy, an elementary school which they opened in January 2007 which now educates 150 students from the proceeds from the sales of soapstone crafts.
© SERRV
OTICART International Limited
In 1995 Claytone Ombasyi, a Christian businessman in Nairobi, Kenya, started OTIC, a privately held export and marketing company. Ombasyi, with professional experience in exporting and marketing, wanted to help local artisans connect with export markets. He operates his business with the utmost integrity and expects the same of others, encouraging artisans to consider their products a reflection of themselves and to use the products to share their vision with customers. OTIC provides export, packaging and quality control support for a number of small workshops in and around Nairobi. Depending on their circumstances, these small groups provide a variety of advantages to their artisans. Some offer training in wood carving, while others provide short–term, no interest loans.
© Ten Thousand Villages
SMOLart Self Help Group
Smolart is a self-help organization in the Western Kenyan community of Kisii, near Lake Victoria. As a unique source of kisii soapstone, this area is home to many artisans who make their living through carving. Smolart seeks to improve the lives of member carvers through marketing and logistical supports. Smolart works with 200 producer members, each of whom is a stakeholder. Each member works with several home-based artisans, for a total of some 1,000 carvers, thus creating job opportunities while also allowing artisans to be closer to their families.The group's mission goes beyond providing a fair wage to artisans; they seek to eradicate poverty among their members, promote fair trade, oppose discrimination, to support community efforts and to manage resources sustainably.
© Ten Thousand Villages
Trinity Jewellery Crafts
Trinity Jewellery Crafts is small jewelry-making business located in Kariobangi, one of the most impoverished areas of Nairobi. Joseph Muchina, the director of Trinity, grew up in a Nairobi slum, which gave him a strong desire to find a way to reduce poverty. Together with two other founding members of Trinity, he was trained by the National Christian Council of Kenya in jewelry making, and they started a small business to employ others in need. In addition to their monthly income, the 7 men and 5 women jewelry makers who work at Trinity all participate in a profit-sharing plan and 10% of their earnings are set aside each month in a pension plan. Joseph says that when they have orders, for the artisans, it means guaranteed food on their table, shelter for those who pay rent for their houses, clothing for their families and most importantly, school needs for their children. Jewelry from Trinity is handmade, with hammered elements, beads from local family bead producers, and traditional African beads.
© SERRV
Mali
Delta Survie
Delta Survie, located in Mopti, Mali, is a center that provides support services to about 200 women a year who are recovering from obstetric fistula. In Mali, one of the poorest countries of the world, women often don't have access to basic health care. Obstetric fistulas can be caused by prolonged labor, lack of pre-natal care, childbirth at an early age, and malnutrition. Women who suffer with obstetric fistulas are often shunned by their husbands and communities because of the infertility, incontinence and infections the condition can cause. At Delta Survie, the women find acceptance and a supportive community. As they undergo medical treatment, which often means several surgeries, Delta Survie trains the women to produce handcrafts, generating income for them while they recover and developing skills which can be used in the future to help support their families.
The women at Delta Survie create jewelry that expresses the beauty and vibrancy of the culture of Mali. The light work of jewelry making is a perfect occupation for the women who are at different stages of recovery and need frequent periods of rest. The opportunities that Delta Survie provides are more important than ever as Mali struggles with the recent unrest. Delta Survie is strongly committed to continuing its work and even expanding as the organization seeks to build housing for the women in a safer neighborhood.
© SERRV
Madagascar
Akany Tsimoka
Akany Tsimoka is taking on big challenges in their home country of Madagascar and responding in creative ways. Facing some of the highest rates of malnutrition and poverty in the world, Akany Tsimoka is a non-profit organization that runs an orphanage and a center that is providing a variety of services to poor families in Antananarivo, Madagascar. The center provides schooling, medical access and on-site pharmacy, and a savings and micro-credit program. It also has job training courses in agriculture, animal husbandry, computers and auto mechanics in addition to an income generation project for craftspeople that produces woven natural fiber products.
© SERRV
Rwanda
Cards From Africa
Our greeting cards are all handcrafted by young people in Rwanda who have been orphaned by genocide or AIDS. The cardmakers are all heads of households, responsible for providing for the remaining younger siblings in their family. Cards from Africa pays above-market wages so that the cardmakers can feed their families and send the younger siblings to school. All the colored papers are made by recycling Rwandan office materials by hand as an expression of environmental stewardship.
© Good Paper
Jyambere Mutegarugori
Jyambere Mutegarugori means Women in Development in Kinyarwandan, the official language of Rwanda. This group of 93 women is located in the western Rwandan village of Muramba, an area gravely affected by the genocide of 1994. Many of the women involved with Jyambere Mutegarugori are widows, having lost their husbands and other family members during the violence in Rwanda. Most are the sole income earners in their households. Having a place to come together, support each other, and provide for their families has made a valuable impact on their lives. The income generation project was started by an enterprising priest who was assigned to the Muramban diocese. During the genocide, 34 of 36 of its local priests were killed, and Muramba's Nyondo diocese went without a priest for 6 years. Father Musinguzi John Bosco, a young Ugandan seminary graduate and engineer, felt a calling to serve the people of Rwanda, and was assigned to Muramba in 2000. The people of Muramba were suffering from poverty, the effects of war, and HIV/AIDS. Father Musinguzi reached out to the international community for help in finding solutions. Among the projects that were started by the diocese were several income generation projects for the widows, including the Jyambere Mutegarugori basket cooperative. In addition to the cooperative, a vocational school, wells providing clean water, an orphanage, and an AIDS education program were built with the help of the Kolping Society in Germany and Engineers without Borders in the U.S.
© SERRV
South Africa
African Home
African Home, based in Cape Town, South Africa, works to empower economically disadvantaged artisans in the country. African Home was established in March 2002 by two South African women who were impressed with the high standard of crafts and concerned about the high rate of unemployment in South Africa. They started African Home in order to open access to worldwide markets for economically disadvantaged craftspeople in South Africa, thus creating more employment. The organization plays a significant role in supporting small one and two-person craft groups to expand and enables them to take on larger orders. African Home supports fair trade principles, and aims to expand craft markets for South African artisans in an ethical and humane manner, paying fair prices and with concern for the environment.
© Ten Thousand Villages
B & B Wholesale Crafts
Ben Ncube started B & B Craft & Recycling in 2002 working in the new South African tradition of making crafts from recycled materials, such as tin cans and discarded wire and incorporating beads in his designs. As the demand for the products he made grew, Ben “the Can man” started training apprentices in the art form, paying them a fair price for the products they produced. The training and production provides a sustainable income for a growing number of young people, women, and people affected by HIV in Cape Town.
His recycled tin can art includes a variety of tin can animal designs as well a tin can plans and people. Recycled tin can crafts in South Africa is often referred to as Township Art.
© Global Crafts
Brass Images
Brass Images was established in 1988 in the coastal town of Plettenberg Bay, South Africa, about a 4 hour drive out of Cape Town . The long lasting success of the project is due to the fact that the group develops new designs on a regular basis and pays great attention to detail and quality. Brass Images employs 15 people from the local community to help create high quality fashion jewelry. As demand grows, the organization hires and trains more artisans, providing sustainable income in an area in need of employment.
Solid brass and copper are the base materials of the product. By applying extreme heat, the artisans create the interesting patterns and effects on the jewelry. No dyes are used. Each item is entirely handmade and a one-of-a-kind piece of art.
© Global Crafts
Swaziland
Eswatini Swazi Kitchen
The Eswatini Swazi Kitchen is a project of Manzini Youth Care, an organization in Swaziland that is addressing both the roots and the impact of severe poverty in Swaziland. Eswatini Kitchen generates employment for women who make jams, chutneys, marmalades, and gift baskets. It also is an income generating project whose proceeds help to run the Manzini Youth Care program, which provides housing, food and education at several centers to former street children, many of whom are HIV/AIDS orphans.
Consumers who spread Eswatini Kitchen's jams, jellies and chutnies on their toast in the morning make an immediate connection with a network of several hundred Swazi men, women, and youth, including the women who work full-time in the kitchen, the Swazi farmers who grow the fruit, and the hundreds of children receiving care at the youth centers.
© SERRV
Tintsaba
Tintsaba, which means 'mountains" in the local Swazi dialect, was created in 1985 to improve the lives of rural Swazi women. Tintsaba started with just 12 women, and, to date, has trained almost 900 women and exports its sisal baskets and jewelry to buyers around the world. Training is the essence of Tintsaba. Today, nearly 1000 rural women receive training in literacy, business English, committee structure, health education and production techniques. A mobile homeopathic clinic serves rural groups and staff suffering from HIV/AIDS.
© SERRV
Uganda
AWOU
NAWOU, The National Association of Women's Organizations in Uganda, is a non-governmental organization representing women's groups in Uganda. The goal of NAWOU is to improve the status and living conditions of women in Uganda and to make women self-reliant. In addition to running income generation projects, NAWOU is also involved in micro credit, information and research, advocacy, and lobbying for women's rights. NAWOU's handcraft project supports 70 women's handcraft groups, representing over 1,000 women. With the income earned from making handcrafts, the women provide needed resources to their families. Having a sustainable source of income has not only improved their self esteem and confidence, but has also enabled women to cope with social economic issues and has given the women a stronger voice in their families and communities. Earning their own income has meant that women are able to make decisions and be less dependent on men for accessing their basic needs like food, shelter, health and education for their children.
© SERRV
Zimbabwe
Eco Africa-Wholesale Gifts
Eco Africa raises money to supply the basic necessities of life starting with food packages for families as food became first unobtainable and then is unaffordable in Zimbabwe. As the country starts to stabilize and funding increases the vision is to build a new Crafting Center with a clean water well and in addition to food and essentials, to provide daycare, scholarships for the children and health advisory services. Eco Africa crafters make up a self sustaining collective of proudly expert women capable of running their own organization and fulfilling and shipping orders to customers all over the world.
© Global Crafts
Gugu Crafters Wholesale
As Zimbabwe refugees in South Africa, Gugulethu Mapuranga, her husband Shakespear, and some of their friends and family started GuguCrafters after realizing that the craft sector in South Africa could provide a much-needed sustainable income. The artisans honed their skills and designed unique jewelry items and other products from discarded materials. While hoping they had found safe haven from the turmoil and economic collapse in Zimbabwe, the group found itself in 2008 the victim of xenophobic attacks, and their small shop was burned down. However, after two months, the resilient group was able to purchase new tools and materials with fair trade customers advances and begin again making jewelry from their homes in Cape Town.
© Global Crafts