BEHIND THE VEIL (September 2004 – December
2007)
Location within Country
Sindh, Punjab, KPK, Baluchistan
Name of Associated Agencies
USAID, MEDA Canada
Context
Behind the Veil (BtV) was an ambitious market development program
which facilitated sustainable economic advancement through the
integration of homebound women embroiderers in three conservative
areas of Pakistan into profitable value chains. The three-year
project was implemented by ECDI in partnership with the MEDA,
Canada. BtV piloted a unique women-to-women sales network through
which poor sequestered rural women were directly linked with
mainstream urban wholesalers and retailers. Mobile women sales
agents (SAs) from the local community were trained and deployed as
part of an innovative business model to replace traditional male
middlemen who were unable to undertake face-to-face negotiations
with women embroiderers due to constraints of purdah, effectively
curtailing women’s market interaction and bargaining authority..
.
Objectives of the project
To enhance SAs’ capacity through the development of three key
business development services (BDS) markets:
1) a package of services including market access, product
development and input supply for rural embroiderers;
2) market access for urban micro-garment makers (who use
hand-embroidered fabrics); and
3) product development and design services for urban micro-garment
makers (women), retailers, exporters and women sales agents who
interact with the rural women embroiderers.
Results / Impact
Behind the Veil
reached over 9000 embroiderers against an initial target of 6000,
and has seen incomes raised by two to three times. The network
enabled homebound women to augment incomes without breaking with
traditional norms governing mobility and interaction with males by
providing them with a culturally acceptable means of reaching higher
value markets. SAs purchase finished fabrics from embroiderers and
wholesale them. The intermediaries also served as critical sources
of market information and provided quality control and contemporary
designs to optimize embroiderers’ outputs. The program successfully
created 213 mobile SAs.
ECDI’S tasks in the project
