Work shed construction for wood carving artisans…
An infrastructural support initiative …

SETU strives to support their partner artisans in holistic ways for overall capacity building. Infrastructure is integral to capacity building, empowering artisans to develop skills, improve outputs, and sustain their craft for long-term success. It plays an important role towards enhancing the production scalability of artisans so as to meet the challenging variations of market demand. It helps build & strengthen their capacity to meet quality and quantity standards in time framed environment to keep pace with the needs of the buyers.

SETU team visited the workplace of one of their wood carving artisans in Bijnor Dist., U.P. The main aim was to understand the needs of the artisans, if any, and identify ways to make their work easier and more convenient. SETU team observed the entire process from arranging the raw materials to finishing of the goods.

While visiting the group, it was observed that the production was being carried out in small, makeshift, rented rooms that lacked sufficient space for machinery, raw materials as well as products under various stages of production. Unexpected heavy rains or heat could adversely impact the production process and the quality of the goods, affecting the workers’ livelihood. The artisans encountered insufficient space even to store the fully finished goods. Many times, the lack of sufficient storage and workspace forced the workers to operate elsewhere, which increased the cost of production and also hindered the development of new products & designs, impacting worker motivation and market sales. This also caused delays in production and fulfillment, which could cause artisans to lose out financially in the long run.

Their group head showed a private area, comprising a waste filled land with boundary walls made of bricks with no plaster on the walls, floors, roof or doors. This area belonged to him and could be used by investing some amount, but artisan group was unable to proceed due to financial constraints. And therefore, SETU Society decided to provide them with financial assistance in construction of a suitable work shed.

As evident from the images below, the entire artisan group benefitted tremendously from the new work shed which was not only safe & comfortable, but also helped them in working in a more organized and economical manner….