LATEST NEWS

"HOPE MEANS A LIVING WAGE FOR WOMEN AND YOUTH"
by Sara Feldman
09-SEPT-2008

Voices is proud to announce that in the coming weeks youth and women will begin training with award winning Caroline Awour Agwanda as we take the first steps into a new fair trade microenterprise venture. Ms. Agwanda was only twenty-one years old when she founded Hyacinth Ornaments Production Enterprise (HOPE), a Kenyan business that specializes in making jewelry, paper products, and baskets from the water hyacinth plant found in Lake Victoria.

Water hyacinth, which floats on the surface of the water, greatly affects community access to the lake. The plant reduces the supply of clean potable water and causes difficulties in water extraction, blocking irrigation canals and increasing transportation costs, reducing fish catches and decreasing available landing sites.

Ms. Agwanda's ability to turn this problem plant into marketable products earned her recognition by the United Nations Women's Fund (UNIFEM) in August 2000, when she was awarded a prize for outstanding entrepreneurial achievement. Her ability to come up with an environmentally beneficial way to empower women and youth to earn a living wage is especially notable as she is physically disabled. We look forward to working closely with Ms. Agwanda as we move forward with this project.     

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OTHER NEWS

Okok Widows Group is working with voices to begin distribution of fair trade avocado oil and other products to American company Anti-Body.    

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