Saturday, March 15, 2014

Flora Craft for a CAUSE

This project undertaken under the umbrella activities of Flora-Craft is an initiative to work with the tribal women of Sholayur, Kerala, India, to help sustain them economically and bring about better living conditions among them. These women are not able to do the hard work that working in the fields entails, due to some disability or ill health or old age, because of which they are not able to bring in income for their households. Their men folk either drink away the money, or the money they bring in is not enough. These women will be trained to work in pottery. They will then work on job work basis to earn a decent living. Anyone buying Flora-Craft products is in fact contributing toward the welfare of these tribals.

Further, we will be working with natural products like arecanut leaves and pods and fruits to make elegant vases and pots as home décor items. These will be hand made items again made by the tribals of Sholayur.

We are currently not accepting donations for this project as we do not have 80G exemption facilities, nor do we have the drive to raise such funding. We want to raise money for this initiative through sales of the products of Flora-Craft.

The project will cost us Rs. 15 to 17 Lakhs (Rs. 1.5 to 1.7 million). This is to build a 40x60 covered shed, a couple of washrooms, storage facilities and potter's wheels and kilns for firing on my 2 acre property. This is apart from the consumables cost.

75% of profit margins will go toward the fund allocated for this project and the remaining 25% towards the overhead costs of running Flora-Craft. We would like to get started on the construction and training within the next 12 months. We have a long, long way to go, as it is not easy to raise this kind of money within this short time.

Anybody buying Flora-Craft products will in actuality be contributing to the welfare of these poor people. Therefore I encourage all who read this post, to send in their requests for Flora-Craft products by email to sheila.mathews.09@gmail.com. The Flora-Craft Website will be up shortly which will then provide you an easy way to select your product and pay for the same.

Please don't just like my stuff; buy them!

Thank you in advance to all who wish to support this cause!

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