Traidcraft Exchange - SustainableTextiles
The textile industry in India provides vital income and employment for thousands of people. However, most textile workers live in poverty earning around £2.80 per day typically working in small unregulated textile enterprises, in unsafe working conditions. Garment manufacturing is resource intensive and highly polluting, especially the printing and dying processes, with large volumes of contaminated waste water released into rivers, damaging eco-systems and posing serious health risks to local communities.
TRAID is supporting Traidcraft Exchange with a grant of £62,212 to develop a tool-kit to help small businesses produce textiles without damaging the health and environment of workers and surrounding communities. The tool-kit will contain picture led information for textile business owners and workers to establish low cost pollution control measures and safety equipment.
Once the tool-kit is tested and refined, the approach will be shared with other small textile businesses across India covering over 450,000 people. Low cost eco-friendly technologies will be promoted to deal with pollution, waste treatment and water conservation. This will reduce water consumption, the contamination of water sources and improve the lives and environment of workers.
The project will work initially with clusters of small block printing businesses reaching around 150 families in the Bagru district of Rajasthan, an area suffering extreme water shortage and environmental degradation. Traidcraft has set up an eco-friendly water treatment facility with a small textile business, and will use it as a model to demonstrate the viability and affordability of producing environmentally friendly textiles.
TRAID will update the website regularly with project news and developments. To find out more about Traidcraft Exchange visit www.traidcraft.co.uk
