At World of Good, we work with grassroots organizations that provide employment opportunities and fair wages to disadvantaged women artisans in developing countries. We source products from these groups to provide them with access to a market of socially-conscious consumers.
One such group is Conserve, founded to tackle the problems of the vast mountains of garbage that litter the streets of the city of New Delhi, and the plight of the poor who sort and collect all that garbage. Conserve has developed an innovative process that employs women to transform dingy plastic bags collected from the streets into beautiful bags and wallets.
As more and more people move into Delhi from rural areas, the amount of waste that is produced has begun to cause problems for the already overcrowded city. Plastic grocery bags litter the streets and get caught in the city’s gutters and drainage pipes during rainy season, causing flooding.
As a result, an informal “rag-picking industry” has emerged as the poorest of Delhi’s poor sort and collect the materials for recycling. Rag-pickers–most of whom belong to the lowest castes and are considered "untouchable"–are exploited by contractors who pay them just pennies for their work, then re-sell the plastic to recycling centers for much higher rates.
Since they don’t use any dyes for the bags, Conserve trains the rag-pickers how to identify exactly the colors and quality of bags they need and make sure they pay them above the going market rate for their collection.
Women are then trained and employed to sort, wash and cut the plastic bags. They use a patented amalgamation process to fuse the cleaned plastic strips into multi-colored materials. The women are taught sewing skills to create beautiful bags and wallets out of the now-transformed plastic "garbage.
From its inception in 2003 with the will to solve two daunting problems– the environmental problem of plastic litter, and the socio-economic problem of poverty among the city’s slums– Conserve has come a long way. The organization now provides fair wages and employment to more than 300 women. As we wrap up this shopping season, this organization’s story can serve to remind us of the impact our dollars can make to break harmful systems of wastefulness and exploitation. All it takes is a little mindfulness about our shopping decisions, and a little will to make a difference.
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