WomensDayQuote

On International Women’s Day in March, we launched a blog series highlighting women around the world and the changes they are driving to advance women economically, politically, and socially.

Women like María Estela Barco Huerta of DESMI (translated as Social and Economic Development for Indigenous Mexicans) who is being honored at our Human Rights Awards for her work promoting food sovereignty in Chiapas, Mexico.

To Kamala Devi, a Fair Trade artisan in India, and Lizzie Zuniga who has built up a successful Fair Trade business in Colombia around tagua seeds.

As we celebrate Mother’s Day this weekend, we also reflect on the strength of these women who often serve as the primary caretakers of the household.

From the mothers in the Gumutindo Coffee Co-op in Uganda to the mothers living along the US/Mexican border saying “No Mas Muertes” and are building a community where people feel safe and secure.

We thank these women for sharing their stories with all of us and for inspiring change everyday.

Read the Women Around the World Inspiring Change’ blog series on our People-to-People and Fair Trade blogs.

WomensDayQuote-300x255The following piece is part of our ‘Women Around the World Inspiring Change’ blog series that will run until Mother’s Day 2014.

So far, we have featured a women’s group in Nogales, Mexico Hogar de Esperanza y Paz/Home of Hope and Peace (HEPAC),  María Estela Barco Huerta, an incredible leader of DESMI (Desarrollo Económico Social de los Mexicanos Indígenas), and a partnership between the Fair Trade company, Equal Exchange, and women in the 10 primary societies of Gumutindo Coffee Co-op in Uganda.

Now, meet a mother behind the beautiful Fair Trade tote bags in Rajasthan, India.

#mothersacrossborders

Sitting on the soft ground in a pile of kantha stitch quilts with a group of mother artisans, I met a strong and contented Kamala.

Kamala is part of a strong community of artisans in a small village near Barmer, Rajasthan that hand-makes our Global Exchange Eco-shopper membership bags.

As I mentioned in my first travel post, it is a tradition for men to block print, and women to quilt. The women’s workspace is a rectangular tent made by hand from woven leaves and branches that protect us from sun and captures any breeze that comes by.

I see women clad in fuchsia and neon orange saris, gold and gemstone earrings and nose rings, and stacks of plastic bangles.  The colors of their clothing are so vibrant and creates a beautiful contrast to the desert all around.

I am invited to sit with the artisans. One woman starts talking to me, so I grab my guides Riya and Anjuli to translate. I understand the woman is asking how many children I have. “I have one boy, he’s 9.”

She follows-up by asking how many years I’ve been married. I tell Riya, my current translator, that I am not married. She looks at me and softly says, just tell her something. So she tells the woman I’ve been married for 5 years. The woman I’m speaking with seems satisfied and re-focuses on her stitching.

Next, I sit down next to a young woman with a beautiful smile covered by transparent neon orange fabric.

#mothersacrossbordersSome of the women are wearing white plastic bangles that start small at their elbow and increase in size up to their shoulder. I ask the woman in orange why isn’t she wearing them: “ Women are given these bangles when they are married. New laws say we are only required to wear them for 3 years after marriage, and I have been married for 12 years.”

The woman I’ve been speaking to is Kamala Devi. She is 30 years old. She has been married for 12 years, and has 3 children, 1 boy and 2 girls. Kamala was born and raised in Chohtan, a small village just outside of Barmer. All of her children are in school, and she says she will teach her daughter the art of stitching- like her mother taught her – in addition to schooling.

I ask Kamala a few questions:

#mothersacrossbordersWhat do you love about being a mother? Being a mother is wonderful. I love my children and want them to  finish school and go on to become good humans.

How did you meet your husband? She laughs, It was arranged by my mother.

Will you arrange your daughters’ wedding? “Yes.”

Who are your best friends? “The women I work with.”

What do you talk about? “We talk about family and our work.”

What do you do in your free time? Kamala laughs,  “After I finish my house chores I come to work. I have no free time.”

What is your art form? “I work in appliqué stitching and metal. I have been working for 10 years.”

What is your favorite color? “Yellow.”

#mothersacrossbordersI look to my left and see that one artisan has pulled a bottle of bright blue nail polish from her blouse and is painting my friend Kelly’s nails. I look to my right and see that my friend Erin is trading her sunglasses for earrings and a sari. Before I leave, I give Kamala a hug. All the other women found this very funny, and want hugs too. When I said “Bye”, it was just too funny.  As I walked back to the bus, I heard the women mimicking me…”Bye, Bye, Bye…”.

I was in Rajasthan for two weeks. I had three Indian women guides, who patiently answered my daily questions about the roles of women in India. What really was beautiful is that in a country that has a caste system, where marriages are arranged and village women have seemingly no choice, there is still a celebration of womanhood.

I saw happiness in the color of their dress, and in their smiles. There is immense strength in their community. I observed the respect that younger women showed for elder women. They bowed and touched the feet of their elders. The artisans I met had a strong eye contact, pride in their work, and joy as they speak. They all had voices, and are empowered by Fair Trade to determine the value of their work by creating the prices of their art.

I asked Kamala “Are you happy” she answered, “Yes”.

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WomensDayQuote-300x255The following piece is part of our ‘Women Around the World Inspiring Change’ blog series that will run until Mother’s Day 2014.

So far, we have featured a women’s group in Nogales, Mexico Hogar de Esperanza y Paz/Home of Hope and Peace (HEPAC),  María Estela Barco Huerta, an incredible leader of DESMI (Desarrollo Económico Social de los Mexicanos Indígenas), and a partnership between the Fair Trade company, Equal Exchange, and women in the 10 primary societies of Gumutindo Coffee Co-op in Uganda.

Now, meet the women behind a Fair Trade tagua jewelry business in Bogota, Colombia.

Tagua Artisan and Business Woman Lizzie Zuniga

Tagua Seed Jewelry Artisan and Business Woman Lizzie Zuniga

Arriving from the airport into the Colombian capital city of Bogota, the main avenue is lined with the brilliant color of public art.

Every wall along Avenida Gaitan (named after the populist leader Jorge Eliecer Gaitan) tells a bold story of armed conflict and the resilience of the peoples’ movement for peace and justice.  I was in Bogota to spend time with the artisans who produce the Global Exchange Fair Trade Store’s line of Fair Trade tagua seed jewelry.  In one mural an indigenous woman, wrapped in the cloth of her cultural heritage, outstretches her hands to the cars rushing past.  The word “Esperanza”, or “Hope”, is painted in neon behind her. The women artisans we have partnered with in Bogota are working for just that.

Tagua Seed Pod

Tagua Seed Pod

Lizzie Zuniga moved to Bogota from Chiquinquira, a small town in the Western Boyaca Province located three hours north from the capital city.  She and her partner Nicolas survived their first years in the city making and selling tagua seed jewelry in the street.  Tagua seeds grow wild in Boyaca and when Lizzie and Nicolas moved to the city they depended on this natural resource of their homeland to sustain their new urban livelihood.

Whole Tagua seeds that have been died green

Whole Tagua seeds that have been died green

Tagua seeds grow in large pods on the trunk of Ivory Palms.  The seeds remain gelatinous until the pod falls to the ground, where it can be peeled open to harvest the hard, smooth white seeds.  Lizzie explains to me that the harvest cannot be rushed, as the resilience of the seeds depends on their full maturation.  And so her business in Bogota grew, slowly and organically, with the tagua seed at its heart.

In her own words:

“Tagua is where I am from.  It is part of my family and who I have become.  On two different occasions when Nicolas and I had nothing, no shelter or food, we were able to rise and stand with tagua.”

Tagua seeds thinly sliced, dyed and ready to be made into jewelry

Tagua seeds thinly sliced, dyed and ready to be made into jewelry

Today Lizzie runs a sustainable ten-year old business that employs seven artisans in the full-time production of tagua jewelry.  She has partnered with a friend from Chiquinquira, who transports the tagua harvested by local farmers during their off-season, to the city where is it sorted, peeled, tumbled smooth and sliced into slabs in her workshop.

Mother of three, expert dyer, and business woman Sandra Navarette

Mother of three, expert dyer, and business woman Sandra Navarette

Sandra Navarrete has worked with Lizzie for four years in all stages of tagua jewelry production.  She has developed a full knowledge of the trade and considers herself a master artisan and business woman.

In her own words she describes her position:

“I find purpose and possibility in my work.  I am a mother to three daughters and I am very proud that I have developed the capacity and confidence to run a business.  I know all the processes involved.”

She has chosen to work in the dying of the tagua slabs, a highly technical process in which eco-friendly dies are used to set brilliant reds, greens, and indigos. Sandra’s favorite color is purple, though the perfect red is the color she finds the most challenging to achieve.

The Lizzie Penant cut from Tagua Seed and available now is stores or as part of our Mothers Day Gift of Membership program

The Lizzie Pendant cut from tagua seed and available now in the Global Exchange Fair Trade Stores or as part of our Mother’s Day Gift of Membership program

The final product is a sustainably sourced, elegant piece of Fair Trade jewelry that can be sold to sustain a growing community of artisans that have relocated to Bogota from outside provinces.  A large population of people, displaced from rural areas by decades of political violence in Colombia, lives in deep poverty on the outskirts of Bogota.  The women of these communities are rising to create a future for their families through their work as artisans.  In Lizzie’s case, she stays connected to the earth and her origins through the seeds that she works with.  For her, tagua is a seed of hope or esperanza. 

Stop in the Global Exchange Fair Trade Store in Berkeley this Mother’s Day to pick out your favorite from a wide selection of tagua jewelry pieces handmade with love by Lizzie and Sandra.  My favorite is the Lizzie pendant, cut in the shape of a tree from a tagua seed, which comes in all colors.

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You can make your Mama proud this Mother’s Day by gifting her a Fair Trade ‘Proud Mama’ gift box that includes the Lizzie pendant, along with a Putumayo “Women of the World” music CD, Fair Trade Equal Exchange chocolate bar, and a tin of Proud Mama coffee from Equal Exchange.

Get your Proud Mama Gift Box today!

WomensDayQuoteThe following piece is part of our ‘Women Around the World Inspiring Change’ blog series that will run until Mother’s Day 2014. We started with a women’s group in Nogales, Mexico Hogar de Esperanza y Paz/Home of Hope and Peace (HEPAC).

Our next post, titled, Women’s Equality and Food Sovereignty: Solutions Found in Chiapas, Mexico, featured Global Exchange’s 2014 International Human Rights Award honoree, María Estela Barco Huerta, an incredible leader of DESMI (Desarrollo Económico Social de los Mexicanos Indígenas), based in Chiapas, Mexico.

This third post highlights a partnership between the Fair Trade company, Equal Exchange, and women in the 10 primary societies of Gumutindo Coffee Co-op in Uganda.

THE MOTHER’S DAY GIFT BOX HAS SOLD OUT – THANK YOU!!

GX_MomGoMThis Mother’s Day, Global Exchange has teamed up with Equal Exchange with a great box of gifts to show your mom, or any mom, some Fair Trade love. By setting her up with at Global Exchange gift of membership for a year, we’ll also send out:

  • a Putumayo “Women of the World” music CD;
  • a dark chocolate with caramel crunch and sea salt bar from Equal Exchange (3.5 oz);
  • a stylish, handmade tagua seed necklace from a women’s Fair Trade cooperative in Colombia; and
  • a tin of Proud Mama Coffee from Equal Exchange (14 oz.)

And this tin of Proud Mama coffee has a story …

When Beth Ann Caspersen from Equal Exchange explains it, she genuinely sounds like she didn’t know what she was getting in to when she returned from her first trip to Uganda in 2010. Working with Equal Exchange, which supports small farmers around the world by participating in the Fair Trade system, she traveled to Mount Elgon to meet with growers who cultivate for various blends of Equal Exchange coffee, including Proud Mama.

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When she returned to the United States, she began to brainstorm about how Equal Exchange could deepen the impact of Fair Trade and support a project that would draw on the existing structures the women were working with, and would be meaningful to family life and sustainable for the community in the long run.

She reflected that while spending time with the women, she noticed:

“[T]hat as the primary caretakers in these villages, the women spend a lot time in the kitchen. As is the tradition in Uganda, the kitchen is an enclosed space that usually lacks light or ventilation. Picture a small fire in the corner of a room that is filled with smoke. It is a difficult place to prepare food for the family; the smoke burns your eyes, fills your lungs and makes it a very unattractive place to work, let alone spend time with your family. Each fire can accommodate only one pot, sometimes two, but to manage both and keep the meal moving is difficult and time consuming.”

img_1481And so began The Stove Project. Starting quickly with the small sum of $4,000 and working with the community and advisors, a small, but focused, project got off the ground to immediately improve health and provide skills training for leaders of the women’s groups, by building energy-efficient stoves in 50 homes in two different communities.

The Stove Project is not just simple one-way charity. In line with Fair Trade principles, the new stoves are more than just a tool for the kitchen. Already, Beth Ann has seen three substantial impacts beyond the hopes of helping women in Mount Elgon.

  • The new stoves have reduced the amount of firewood necessary to cook by 50 percent, meaning household savings have gone up, meaning more support for other needs.
  • The new stoves are a time saver – multiple dishes can be cooked at the same time. For example, women have said that water for tea boils water faster, which means more time to enjoy a break.
  • The new stoves provide a smoke-free and warmer environment that is safer for everyone. With the design addition of a metal pipe that filters the smoke out of the house family members spend more time together in the warm kitchens.

Take-ActionTAKE ACTION