Pachacuti - Panama Hats and Fair Trade Clothing

On Friday, around 400 children from St Oswald's and Parkside schools in Ashbourne wore sunglasses to school.  The idea of this fundraising exercise was to raise money  for weavers in Ecuador who have poor eyesight yet cannot afford to purchase glasses.  It is a unique way for the children to have fun expressing themselves while learning about global citizenship and helping to make a real and lasting positive impact in the lives of others.

As part of Pachacuti's Fair Trade Certification, every year, together with each producer group, Pachacuti creates an annual action plan that allows producers to direct how Fair Trade will benefit them the most. In 2008 one embroidery group all complained of poor eyesight. In Spring 2009, we paid for eye tests, glasses and eye operations for the 20 workers who required them, totalling $800.

After the success of this project, Pachacuti approached  our co-operative of women Panama hat weavers based in Ecuador and enquired if the 300+ weavers might need glasses. The answer was a resounding YES. 

The women live in a poor, rural region of Southern Ecuador and rely on the weaving of hats as their primary source of income. This traditional skill is demanding work and requires good eyesight to produce quality hats.  To remedy this situation Pachacuti and the Co-operative decided to make the purchasing of glasses for the weavers their primary goal for their 2010 Fair Trade Action Plan.

Pachacuti arranged for eye exams to be given to the weavers and it was determined just over 200 of the women required glasses, with 65 weavers being prioritised as needing glasses urgently. This was beyond the financial means of Pachacuti and the co-operative to purchase.  It was with the help of a group of Ashbourne residents that the Sunglasses for Glasses concept was born as a means to achieve the funding for this project. It is our hope that, through the involvement of area school children, we can together raise the money needed for the purchase of the glasses whilst providing an opportunity for the children to learn about global issues and empathy for others.

Sunglasses for Glasses day last week raised enough money for over 30 pairs of glasses, so we are well on our way to our target!  A huge thank you to the schools and children who took part and  I'm looking forward to posting some photographs of our weavers with their new glasses!

 

 

 

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'Creating Opportunities for Marginalised Producers' is the 1st Standard of the World Fair trade Orgnaization.

 

We are delighted that our Panama hats which are woven for Pachacuti by weavers in remote areas of the Ecuadorian highlands are now for sale at a Pop-Up shop in Liberty.  These women have very few opportunities open to them: many are single mothers or wives of alcoholic husbands and they are reliant on income from agriculture and hat weaving.  Many are forced to migrate to cities in search of low paid domestic work, leaving behind their culture and their community.

I believe that this is fantastic example of how opportunities can be created for marginalised producers if they are better organised, resourced and supported through the work of Fair Trade.  Pachacuti's producer groups are now able to secure access to one of the most prestigious stores in London under fair trade conditions, providing them with a decent and dignified livelihood.

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Great coverage in May 2010 UK Vogue for Pachacuti.

 

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Having sold Panama hats for the past 18 years, I thought that it was high time I really put one through its paces on an action-filled safari holiday in Kenya.

Having read on ehow , the website which tells you 'how to do just about anything' that a Panama Hat was the ideal hat to take on Safari, I decided to take a Pachacuti fedora llano weave grade 8 on a 4x4 and horseriding safari in Kenya (although evidently I didn’t wear a panama when riding!) We clearly couldn’t have a Panama hat style called the African Queen without taking it to Africa, so this style was delegated to my 13 year old daughter Sienna to wear.

Our safari holiday was with Tharua Safaris, a family run business based in the Kenyan highlands, sandwiched between the Solio and Ol Pejeta game reserves, both home to the rare black rhino.  Ol Pejeta is situated between the foot hills of the Aberdares and snowcapped Mount Kenya and before leaving for the safari I had seen it listed as the top destination for Eco Safaris.

We arrived at a time of endless rains at the end of a two year drought – great for Kenyan farmers but not so good for riding horses in the exceedingly slippery red mud.  Still, we persevered with a steady ride on the first day and discovered that the weather was deceptive.  As there was almost complete cloud cover, we set off on a three hour ride with a low factor suncream on.  

Obviously I should have realised from two decades of travelling in the Andes that I should use a high factor suncream at altitude the thin air allows more UV to reach the skin.  However, I wasn't aware that the foothills around Mount Kenya were that high but it materialised on my return that we were, in fact, at 2000 metres altitude and, of course, we got burnt.   Fortunately we had riding hats on, but they still don’t shield your face very effectively.

Due to the rains, a decision was made by Martin and Tiddy to travel north to the Mpala reserve where there was apparently no rain, although we would have to travel by 4x4 instead of on horseback.  I didn't realise at the time what an incredible privilege this was. The Mpala Wildlife Foundation operates a biodiversity conservation research center, a 48,000 acre wildlife conservancy and a variety of community health and outreach programs in Laikipia.  At present the reserve is only open to researchers but, as our guides were friends of the reserve manager, we were able to visit the reserve as invited guests.  More to follow in my next blog post about the safari, game drives and animals spotted, included hippos in the river below our tent and an elephant in the campsite!

I hadn't expected the Panama hats to be so well used.  After all, I had intended to be wearing a riding hat a lot of the time!  Standing up in the jeep with our heads out of the roof for several hours a day, the Panamas were invaluable.  We had an early morning game drive, returned for breakfast, drove out again for about three hours for a picnic lunch, then back for a cup of tea and out again for an evening drive.  Even heading out in the late afternoon, the sun was fierce.

I was surprised at how well my Panama hat stayed on, considering it was fairly breezy and we were travelling at quite a speed sometimes on very rough and bumpy dirt tracks.  Although I did put a hand up to ensure my hat stayed on a couple of times in the wind, most of the time I felt very confident that my hat would stay firmly on my head without flying off into the path of a passing giraffe.  

I was even more surprised at my daughter's pronouncement of how great her African Queen Panama was in the sun.  She really dislikes the heat and the extra wide brim of the African Queen provided excellent sun coverage but was still stylish enough for a fashion-conscious teenager to wear - even if there was no-one around for miles to see her!

Anita Roddick built an empire on skincare but still reminded people that "The most effective anti-ageing product is a sun hat." So, next time you go on holiday, please remember what Anita Roddick said and take a hat with you, preferably a Fair Trade Pachacuti Panama hat.

Pachacuti works with a felt hat making workshop in northern Ecuador. In a village which had over 30 hat making workshops in the early 1990s, now only half a dozen remain. This is principally due to the decline in wearing of traditional dress which has meant that they have lost their local market and Pachacuti's work in designing new styles of hat is therefore vitally important for the survival of the workshop with whom we work. In addition to producing for Pachacuti, we also do private label work producing felt hats for companies such as Brora. As well as designing new styles, we also rework the classic felt hats such as the Bowler, the Trilby and the Fedora.

In addition to ensuring that our production process complies with Fair Trade standards, we have undertaken to ensure that our raw materials are produced in as ethical a manner as possible. We were therefore really pleased to have a full tour of the felt-making factory which produces the 'hoods' which are then made into hats by our Fair Trade producers.

The Health & Safety and environmental standards were extremely high, all water was being put through a filtration system and the workers all made far more than the minimum wage. Any leftover wool from the felting process is recycled and given to artisan upholstery workshops to use for padding chairs.

It was fascinating to watch the production of the hoods from the raw sheep's wool as a lot of the machinery used is over 70 years old and the process has changed very little over the years.