Gantsi Craft

It is the beginning of my second week at work and I think it is about time to try and explain what I will be doing. I am working for a non-governmental organization called Gantsi Craft. Gantsi Craft works towards community development of San communities by enabling income generation through craft production.  There are approximately 800 craft producers in 16 settlements that produce a variety of crafts made out of natural resources (ostrich eggshells, leather etc). Gantsi Craft partners with the producers and provides them with many of the materials (for free) and then also buys the finished craft products back from them to sell in their retail shop as well to sell wholesale through their sister organization, San Arts and Crafts (the organization that Sarah works for).  This allows the producers a way of earning an income that is sustainable and that is sensitive to their unique culture which they are trying to preserve in the extreme social-political context in which they live. The organization works directly with the communities and producers, conducting craft workshops, but also providing workshops on major issues of concern in the settlements such as TB and HIV/AIDS.

Essentially, what I will be doing is gathering information on the different natural resources available in each of the settlements so that I can make recommendations as to what types of crafts should be produced at which settlements. This will allow for both the producer’s production methods and the organization as a whole to become more efficient and sustainable. Currently, a large barrier is that the San have lost control of much of the land they used to have and thus resource rights have become very complicated. So, one of my projects over the next few months is to travel to the various settlements (I am leaving on Sunday for a week for my first settlement visit) and speak with producers (through a translator) to gather as much information as I can regarding the types of resources available (seeds, shells, skins, rocks) and what types of crafts can be made with them. I will also try to gather information on the producers themselves regarding their age, gender, and employment status in order for Gantsi Craft to better understand how to effectively cater their workshops to the producer groups. One area of concern that I have noticed so far is that almost all of the producers are currently women.  Gantsi Craft would like to figure out a way to get men more involved in the craft production process. For example, perhaps they could provide more opportunities for leather creation in some of the settlements.

Gantsi Craft Office and Retail Shop

This is my office and my coworker Elda. She is the shop manager.

Gantsi Craft Retail Shop selling San products

Another project I am currently working on together with Sarah is creating a Standard File of every single craft product available through both Gantsi Craft and San Arts and Crafts. Currently, no such document exists and as I have seen in this past week, the process for creating one is incredibly frustrating. There is a lot of missing information and I feel like we are asking questions that no one has an answer to. But, we have slowly been making progress and are now at a point where we can sit down with our boss (she is currently the coordinator of both Gantsi Craft and San Arts and Crafts) and discuss ways forward for creating the document. One thing I have learned this week is that patience is definitely a virtue and sometimes you just have to sit back and let things go at their own pace (even if it is much slower than I am used to).

 Hard at work at San Arts and Crafts

In the meantime, I have just been trying to understand exactly what it is that Gantsi Craft does through reading various documents and reports from the last few years. I have also been trying to become familiar with the product lines which actually pretty fun, especially because most of the products are jewellery. As you can see, Sarah and I got a little sidetracked one afternoon, and decided to try a lot of it on.

 

All of my coworkers and the staff at San Arts and Crafts (where I spent most of last week because I was working on the Standard File) are incredibly nice. Yesterday afternoon, the field coordinator, Namaswe, came back from the field with a new shipment of necklaces and dancing rattles. The dancing rattles are really amazing. They are made out of a whole bunch of cocoons filled with seeds and then they are tied together. They are then tied around your legs and are used to make rattling sounds during traditional dances. Of course, we had to try them on and see how they worked. I am very excited to see them actually used in traditional dances by the San.



So that has been my experience with work so far. I still have so much to learn about the organization and the San producers. I am really excited to leave for the field on Sunday to see how the organization works outside of an office environment and to gain a better understanding of the craft production process. Despite the sometimes seemingly slow days (again, things just run at a different pace here) I know I have a lot of to learn and I really think it’s going to be an interesting 7 months ahead of me!