Improvement of rural people livelihood
in cold desert areas of the Western Himalayas

LIGHT : wool transformation

Context

Many kinds of wool are available in the villages of Ladakh : yak and goat wool in the highest parts, and sheep wool elsewhere. Every ladakhi family traditionally transforms it in different items : clothes, carpets, shoes, blankets, as well as tents...

But this local handicraft is quite rough, and only dedicated to the households utilisation. The precious pashmina and other exceeding raw material are since centuries mostly sold in Kashmir where it is transformed in high cost shawls or other woollen products.

As raw material is sold without transformation, the income generated in Ladakh is very modest as compared to the potentialities.

Objectives

The project aims at developing wool transformation as an income generating and women empowering activity. It supports 20 Women Self Help Groups (SHG), paying particular attention on enabling the women to control the whole channel, from raw material purchasing to production and marketing, in order to insure the sustainability of the activity after the project end.

Activities

The projects supports the SHG in the different dimensions of the activity:

 

• Activity management: groups are trained to plan their production and record their income and expenditure (simplified accounts), so that they can plan their future investments (raw material, tools purchasing...)

   

• Technical skills improvement: technical trainings are provided to the groups, according to their needs (on knitting, natural dyeing, weaving, tailoring...)

   

• Appropriate technology: to alleviate the some transformation tasks and diminish the time required, appropriate techniques are proposed and taught (carding machines, spinning wheels, frame looms...)

   

• Microcredit: if required, during the first years of the activity, the project provides loans to the groups, as revolving fund. To facilitate the investment in tools, it proposes the payment in different instalments

   

• Marketing: SHG market their products locally, to villagers or tourists, either by themselves, either through a shopkeeper. Marketing tools are developed, and linkages with shopkeepers or other buyers are created

          

 

 

 

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