General Introduction
PIDU Division as part of UNDP Project and Scaling up of Income Generation through Traditional crafts and Textiles Marketing and Promotion under the Trainings Budget as planned activity(18month rolling work plan Jan2015 to June 2016) Natural Dye Training in order to train the rural artisans mainly weavers in the art of natural dye .
Bhutanese weavers are masters at the art of weaving and only need guidance on maintaining quality and calculating prices, they are not organized but have great potential and need help marketing their products .Bhutanese weavers in the past possessed the knowledge of natural dyes and passed it down from generation to generation in recent times looking for convenience and with changing times chemical dyes and pre dyed yarn has taken over ,in order to preserve the indigenous art of dye and ensure that it is not a lost art and educate the people.
The Training is linked to the export and increased production of natural dye products focusing mainly on educating the weavers on how to use locally available raw materials and using both traditional and modern methods. The Training is conducted in the area where we have raw material bank and have facilitated the weaving group with funds for them to use In order to have all factors to ensure that their weaving group is a success. APIC covers all aspects raw material availability, finance and training under this particular project. We also are working on trying to create a market.
Overall Objectives
The main objectives as per AWP are to develop capacities that will help in income generation activities.
This particular training has helped train rural weavers on the art of natural dye.
Training rural women on natural dye encourages them to use locally available raw material that is found or grown in our country. It is environmentally friendly when done in a sustainable manner.
The other objective is to teach them new techniques and best practices and to preserve the indigenous knowledge of natural dye processes.
One of the objectives was to create awareness and discuss the utilization of the funds that was provided to the group and consultation on the usage of funds so that it is utilized efficiently and the group can generate income.
To teach the weavers color combinations and explain to them international standards of color resource person was JICA volunteer.