Weaving Change

In a tiny Sumatran fishing village on the edge of the Andaman Sea, women are weaving wonders and leaders are being made. Sarah Porter reports from Indonesia’s northernmost tip.

North Sumatra’s Trans-Sumatran highway cuts its way southeast from Banda Aceh, through a number of tiny fishing and farming villages, including one called Trienggadeng, in Pidie Jaya subdistrict.

Nestled in the heart of this seaside community, where fishing boats seem to spend more time anchored at shore than they do at sea, there is a cooperative of women working together under the direction of Anton Clark, an Australian volunteer with the Indonesian fair trade and rural cooperative organization Pekerti Nusantra.

Trienggadeng village is, on a good day, a three-hour drive from the city of Banda Aceh. The highway that runs from Sumatra’s tip down to Medan is riddled with potholes and most drivers disperse themselves across the often-unmarked bitumen, two lanes at a time, overtaking each other wherever possible.

But for the many women who work with Anton, the highway that passes through their village is of no concern; their experiences outside Trienggadeng have been few and far between.

Poverty and unemployment here is the norm. Many families and rural businesses were destroyed when the 2004 tsunami all but wiped out the village. Others villagers speak quietly of losses suffered throughout Aceh’s years of political and military upheaval.

Some of the women and families Anton has helped employ live in new homes -- little timber shoeboxes provided by post-tsunami international aid, while others have hung on to more substantial cement homes that survived the whitewash.

If their house is spacious, it is inevitably full of children, relatives and others in need of a place to call home. If their house is small, the same seems to apply. There is always a collaboration of chickens, goats and geese out the front.

Post-tsunami aid workers have been busy in this town, but not all efforts have been successful and very few have resulted in long-term employment opportunities for villagers.

Today, however, local women Siti Safiyah, Nur Azizah and Murniati have each found a means to an end through Trienggadeng’s Koperasi Wanita, Seuke Aceh, Pandan Aceh – The Aceh Women’s Pandan Co-op.

Their base is a tiny but attractiveroad-side shop showcasing mats, handbags, purses and handicrafts made from pandan leaves.

And thanks to business training provided by Anton and further handicraft training in Yogyakarta, Siti, Nur and Murniati have also become leaders and teachers for others in their community.

The day of our interview, the women are working at their co-op’s stand during a large opening ceremony for 100 new homes built for a nearby village by the aid organization Save the Children.

The women’s stand is a small table alongside four other organizations peddling insurance, micro finance business loans and other post-tsunami tools.

But unlike the others, Pekerti’s stand is jam packed with hot-off-the-press pandan products, some of which have been made especially for this event.

Beautiful, softly weaved mats in colors of pink and blues, purples and orange are on display, alongside equally colorful handbags, purses, boxes and baskets, each handmade and woven using a traditional Indonesian technique.

The event is a huge celebration and other villagers have been bussed in from surrounding regions. There are speeches, children’s performances of traditional songs and dances, a lunchtime extravaganza for 700 guests. Dozens of media organizations are present and the excitement is palpable.

But Siti, Nur and Murniati take it all their stride, and with only a little help from Anton and the Pekerti team leader, 26-year-old Acehnese Muhammad Fazal (Borju), these women quietly answer the public’s questions about their products, make sales, pose for photos, collect money and write receipts.

For many, this may be the simple stuff of a school fete, or a roadside market. But these women are making use of the business tools Anton and Borju have worked hard to teach them -- and they are making money.

“Anton has been able to show us how to make a new life. He has shown us these things for our future,” says Nur, supported by nods from her co-workers.

Pekerti offers training in business and product development and handicraft skills, and with Anton’s help, a share farm facility has been developed from where the women’s co-op strip pandan leaves by hand, before they work together to dry, boil, color and weave the final products.

But it’s not all about lessons in manual labor. Pekerti’s aim is to provide the communities within which it works not only vocational training, but market development and business skills for the future.

“We don’t just donate sewing machines and fishing boats and walk away in six months time, which is what a lot of aid providers have done in Aceh,” says Borju.

“We teach the women how to weave, yes, but we also teach about running the business, about the money and about teaching others in their community,” he says.

“Other NGOs don’t think about the marketing all the time. Anton has taught us to think about marketing, finance and business development.”

Borju says he was shocked at the level of commitment Anton demanded from his team, but now he’s proud of what they have achieved and says he will often work until midnight, even if it means not seeing his girlfriend for a day.

“Sometimes my girlfriend is not happy that I am working all the time, but I am happy now to work and I feel like I have a future. Work is not easy to get here, my English must be better, but one day I would like to take over Anton’s job,” he says.

Anton’s background in horticulture and small business management has helped him stay focused on building the cooperative’s agricultural sustainability and competitive edge.

He uses terms like capacity building, ethically produced products and international market development, and talks of reducing production costs by up to 75 percent to increase profits for his cooperative.

He spends his spare time writing proposals to international conglomerates, banks and businesspeople; he wants more funding, new partnerships, and is building relationships with retailers in America, Britain and Australia.

“I have a dream and I want to see these products sold all over the world,” he says. “But the money will all come back to the people here for their future, that’s what this is all about.”

Watching Anton back in the office behind the shop as he writes whiteboard lists of tasks for his staff, throwing instructions left, right and center, it’s difficult to determine what his staff and workers actually think of him.

One Pekerti co-worker says quietly, “Anton, he is everywhere, he makes everyone work hard, but he is making money for us, and he is teaching us how to make money.”

Nur and Siti giggle like schoolgirls when they are asked their opinion of Anton.

“He makes us work hard, and sometimes we can’t always come away from our home to help in the shop,” says Nur. “And sometimes we don’t always fill out our books properly.”

But when asked what the hardest part of their work is, they extend their arms and show me their hands.

“Stripping the leaves is hard,” Nur says. “Cutting and stripping is the very hard work.”

“And we don’t like to breathe in the fumes from the coloring, we really don’t like that,” Siti says.

But they are visibly proud of their products on display. They carefully count the money they made at the lunchtime event as they go through their receipt book.

“Yes, my husband is pleased I can make the money, and my family is happy I can work from home,” Siti says.

So what else do they hope to see on sale in their shop for passersby and tourists?

“We can make anything, we will make everything,” they tell me with wide smiles.

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