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- HANDS OF AFRICA PROJECT REPORT Updated: September 14th 2012

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TULIME community cooperation

We were born as a small and light association, willing to go on this way. We reversed the common idea of development depending on high policies, and chose to define our own policy, which is founded on the real needs of the communities that we cooperate with, both in Italy and abroad. We started 10 years ago, in a village on the upland of Iringa (Tanzania) called Pomerini. We started small project up with very limited funds, but this let us establish a very virtuous relationship between Italian members of Tulime and the African community. The association never launched great projects that need large economic resources, also because Tulimes policy has always preserved the sustainability and the respect of local traditions. Tulime has been granted by the Region Sicilia so far (with very limited budgets), but above all by the support of citizens who believed in our new policy of community cooperation and supported little and great projects rising right from the villages we cooperate with. At the present time this adventure spread among nine villages (in Tanzania), we started a project in Nepal and we are going to launch a master plan in Uganda as well. We work with the communities where we like to act, that we meet by chance and establish a personal relationship with us.

Hands of Africa
Hands of Africa is a project born in 2011 by the idea of one associate member. As a matter of fact, it already started in 2006 through the realization of a carpentry and a tailors shop, and through projects supporting beekeeping and weaving handicraft. The project actually materialized itself in June 2011, thanks to two skilled members: Roberta Pelliccetti, a young Roman stylist and craftswoman, and Luana Fidani, dealing with the managerial aspects of the project. This experience give birth to: a small cooperative of weaver women, the definition of some style lines in the tailors shop, a survey to make supply chains sustainable (environmentally as well) and fair, both in quality and in work condition.

Results achieved in 2012

In June 2012 Roberta came back to Tanzania to go on collaborating with the tailors shop for a new summer design and a house line. The tailors, Kizito, Wema and Alfonsina, received her with open arms and great enthusiasm, willing to learn new styles and to share skills and ideas with her. They are now sharp and fast, both in learning and producing, with great attention and capability. Their products, such as bags, skirts, headbands, house tools, are quite catchy due to the bride colours that kitenge, typical fabric made of waxprinted cotton, are made of. Everything is softened with an Italian touch of plain patterns, so that this perfect mixture of African and European look comes out with its power to move and recall lands of far away. What is more, consistently with Tulimes line, which takes care of everyones dream, our stylist was given a little pay for her work in Tanzania, and another girl as well, Mariagrazia Palmaccio, went there with Roberta. She is a jewelry designer and deals with reusing old material, each time with newer and newer techniques. She and African women who work earthenware in Pomerini met each other with a great will to work together and, at the same time, it was a great success for purchasers. As far as the cooperative of weavers is concerned, we now aim to give our womens production more quality. For this reason, thanks to Teresias support and skillful hands, Tulime was able to sponsor and start a training for 14 women, divided into three groups. At the end of the training they will be tested and the best 10 will be selected to go on working for Tulime. The coordinator of the project is Silvia Liponi, who has been working in the intercultural field for a while and, furthermore, went to Tanzania last summer in order to deepen managerial and planning aspects of the project. And we must say that her eyes shine each time she talks about Africa!

Hands of Africa in 2012

In 2011, with Hands of Africa we were able to: - pay a regular monthly salary to the local responsible of the project, Novetha Mahanga; - Increase the tailors shop production with new models; - encourage the small enterprises already started by Tulime (including the carpentry) to make innovations and improve their handicraft; - group some people together to let them work autonomously (since the real value of handcraft is the possibility to make a product on ones own) but in the same place, in order to keep each ones identity and, at the same time, share each ones activity; - buy an important provision of textile material; - make a new range of clothes, thanks also to the support of the stylist; - enable a sales point in Pomerini where tourists and local people can buy the projects products, at different prices (lower for local people); - encourage and increase the beeswax production together with the beekeepers group (trained by two Italian beekeepers sent by Tulime for two years), in order to make candles and emollient cream.

Next steps
We now aim to: - Train more people to make new products (metal and fabric fashion jewels, wooden toys); - enlarge the tailors shop and increase the staff; - improve the knowledge of raw material and supply chain for fair trade, with the help of skilled supporters; - research and define a trade network both in Tanzania and in Europe in order to give craftsmen more stability for their job; - strengthen the shop-coffee in Pomerini.

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