NEPAL UPDATE:

NEW PRODUCTS, FAIR-AID & LOOKING FORWARD!

Less than three months ago we returned from Nepal, and what an amazing trip it was.  After 30 years of traveling to Nepal my take away from this trip had been how happy I was to see hope again and a movement forward after their devastating civil war. Something had changed and people felt less tense and more at ease, there was excitement about the future and a lightness in their being.

During that trip in March we celebrated with our friends at ACP the children receiving educational scholarships through our foundation’s fundraising.  We met and listened to young women with such vision and insight that it blew my mind. We worked with producers on hundreds of new products, met with a group of young paraplegic men to help create new recycled rubber products, taught weavers how to weave with plastic bags and found creative ways to use more and more recycled items in our products. We organized and set up our foundation’s newly established “Menstrual Pad Project” and delivered 2 sewing machines to the remote Baseri clinic to start a small economic development project there. We met with the village committee in Baseri that runs the clinic and together we planned for the next 5 years, hiring a new health assistant and exploring the ideas of creating a maternal health center. We explored, laughed and planned for the bright future of Nepal and our artisan friends there.

What a difference a month can make.  With the huge 7.8 magnitude April 25th earthquake, followed by the equally devastating 7.3 earthquake on May 12th life in Nepal has been changed forever. Nepali’s are the most resilient people I know and yet they have been literally shaken to the core.  Luckily all of our producers and friends are safe, but the task of rebuilding their lives and mental health will be a huge endeavor. And so, we move forward, together with them, into the next part of the journey.

So, exactly where does one start to rebuild? Back at square one, but for us with 30 years of strong relationships. For Ganesh Himal Trading our starting point was with our Fair Trade community. No sooner had the earthquake struck than we heard from stores around the country asking, no, stating, that they were going to help. They set out donation jars on their counters and made pledges to double what they received. They held garage sales in front of their stores, hosted dinners and shopping nights for donations.  There were penny drives, bake sales, concerts, zumbathons and so much more. And there were those who said they’d wait and fundraise until later when everyone had forgotten. Luckily, last summer, we created the non-profit Conscious Connections Foundation and all donations were funneled into that and into to our newly found mission of “Fair Aid”.  We cannot thank you enough for being there to do this vital fundraising right from the start.

With fundraising underway, our most important task was to get food and shelter to those we knew we could reach.  I never thought that my resume would include “relief work” but it sure does now! For the first month after April 25th we worked non-stop to get food and supplies where they were needed (we could write a book about that).  We could not have done any of this direct aid without the next invaluable part of our team: the producers themselves. Every producer we work with was affected, but all of them were ready, despite their own personal difficulties, to go into remote areas, both to their home villages and others to bring relief.  They helped us locate (and bargain for) rice, tents, tin, mosquito netting, dhal, oil and more, which they then helped transport to many devastated villages. Many of our producers live in the Kathmandu Valley but have family homes in the villages of Dhading, Gorkha and Sindupulchok. These areas were destroyed. We were able to get money directly into our producer’s hands so that they were able to begin direct relief work as soon as we contacted them. When tents were not available in Nepal we bought tents in India and had them transported on the top of a bus into Kathmandu, from there they were trucked to the families in Baseri where the clinic and all
homes had been destroyed…the list of what happened due to our producers and network of friends in Nepal goes on and on. In sum we’ve distributed over $27,000 in direct relief to an estimated 1850 families for a cost of about $15/family, this includes shelter and food for a month for a family of 4. Though the building is no longer standing, the clinic in Baseri is now functioning out of temporary tin shed, fully stocked with medicines and serving about 8 people a day thanks to the clinic’s incredible staff! We have raised enough money to rebuild the clinic and are currently in the process of finding a sustainable, earthquake resistant way to rebuild it, hopefully with a Nepali architect and team. Needless to say, we couldn’t have done any of this without our incredible network of Nepali friends on the ground willing to go the extra mile, even when their own situations were dire. Neither could we have done any of this without your help.

And then there is Ganesh Himal Trading and supplying fair trade products from Nepal.  Once again our Fair Trade community and the producers have risen to the task at hand! You all have been ordering, placing advance orders and believing we could go on. You have been patient as we run out of stock and willing to substitute items while we waited to see whether producers could go back to work. Those producers who could do it, went against all odds and started back to work so that, on June 10, only 7 weeks after this catastrophic event, our first shipment from Nepal arrived! It’s unbelievable really, but so great to see the wheel beginning to turn. We don’t have everything, but we have a lot and so we will start with that.

And, what about those amazing producers we work with? Here is a brief summary that will give you an understanding of where we stand at present and in the near future.

Many of the tailors have not returned from their villages as they are trying to provide shelter to their families for the upcoming monsoons (really just days away) and so we have some clothing, but not our regular amount. Once shelters are made the tailors will be back at work for our late July shipment.  Our felt and recycled rubber producers have been hard at work and were able to produce their full orders. The young paraplegic men finished their new recycled rubber products as well!

Our paper producers have lost their printing press and many are unable to move back into their homes, but they have improvised and made journals using prints they had on hand. These are beautiful and will be available in the large journal bundles. Some will be one of a kind! Cards won’t be available until we can help them find a new place to work in Bhaktapur but we are working on that now. It is our hope that they will be back to making their wonderful cards soon. In the meantime they will be able to make some journals and other paper items. The village of Baglung, where the paper is made, was not too badly affected and so we should be able to still get an uninterrupted supply of lokta paper.

The Lagankhal weaving workshop that we helped rebuild several years ago in Kathmandu did survive the quake and so we have recycled runners and placemats & rag rugs. Sadly, many of the homes of the women weavers in Kirtipur were destroyed along with their looms and so we are working with ACP to buy their existing stock of fabrics and we are improvising new products with the resources at hand, including: new silkscreened dishtowels, runners, napkin sets and potholders. CCF and ACP are now working together to build a safe weaving center and new looms for these women to use while they rebuild their homes. CCF has wired $10,000 to ACP for this project and has been researching safe, sustainable building models for use in its construction. In the weeks and months ahead we will work together to get this facility built.

The knitters of all groups have been hard at work sitting in tents outside their homes and using their time to knit.  This has gotten them some much needed income and many of your advance order knits are already here! Some of the  knitters we work with, however, have their family homes in Barpak, the epicenter of the April 25th quake.  Some of these knitters lost many in their extended families. The remoteness of this area made it extremely difficult to get relief there but we provided them with rice and some tents and they persevered and were able to get it in, before the large relief agencies arrived.  We all mourn their incredible loss.

Some of the jewelers that live in the Kathmandu valley are back to work. Others whose family homes are in the village are still helping to create shelter in their villages. We hope that they will also be back to work soon but their needs are to provide for their extended families in the village areas first. We have just received some jewelry and more will be available in our late July shipment.

The soap producers facility is ok and they are also back to work. They were able to send some of their order in June. We designed some new soap products with them in March and those will be coming in the July shipment.

Last, but definitely not least, our dear friends at ACP are all fine and slowly back to work. Their facility sustained some damage but they are able to work there and have been able to stabilize the areas that were affected. Their silkscreening, felting, sewing and dying units are all back to work but many of ACP’s producers, especially in the region of Sindupalchok, have lost everything. ACP will need to help provide relief to many of them. GHT and CCF’s goal is to provide relief for the groups we work with most closely in order to free ACP up to work with others. As we move through the next months we will assess with them their need for Artisan relief and help them to help producers get back on their feet as best we can.

So, what can you expect in the months ahead? GHT and CCF will be working directly with producers to get them back to work. Our next phase is to provide work space to those who have lost their homes and places of work.  This will take some time but our goal is to get people back to work as quickly as possible so that they can begin to have an income stream to rebuild their lives. We have been giving advances to those who need them so that they can buy raw materials since credit is nearly non existent now in the market. Mostly we are trying to be flexible and creative with solutions so that we can get products and get them income. Knowing Nepalis though I expect them to be back to work quickly. They are so resilient!

So, what can you do? Keep ordering and try new items! If we don’t have one thing in stock ask us what we do have and be adventurous! We have so many wonderful products and you may just find one that is a best seller that you’ve never tried before! Look for the new products we are creating using existing stock of what artisans have. These are fun and inspiring and could be one of a kind! Use our new “Celebrate Nepal” labels that we send in your shipment to highlight Nepalese items and encourage people to buy Nepalese goods, and finally, do what you have always done, stand beside us as partners as we stand beside our partners in Nepal and walk forward on this path into a better future. Namaste and thanks for supporting Fair Trade and Fair Aid for Nepal!

Denise