Sindi Shoba takes our spotlight this month, as we move into Women’s month, and her story is one of immense courage, tenacity and an insatiable desire to empower women.
Sindi lives in the Umlalazi Traditional area which borders on Eshowe, in the homestead where she raised her children, whilst attending to the many daily tasks of rural life while her husband takes on a traditional role tending the cattle and family matters. Sindi has educated several of her children and foster children to tertiary level, her eldest son, Jomo is now a Principal of a school and daughter, Nokuthula has an honours degree in public administration.
This Sindi has achieved, largely through working with her hands, in the craft industry. She led the Ngezandlazethu Handwork Project with empathy and compassion for the women who joined the group and they were blessed with vast training opportunities, with esteemed organisations such as Embocraft Training Trust and an exceptionally well resourced workshop and materials. Skills training started with sewing classes facilitated by the Eshowel Rotary Anns who dedicated their time, sourced materials and garnered a regular market for the dog cushions the project produced, providing an income for the sewers. The project grew to beading, hand-painting textiles, screen printing and wire work. The project hired a product developer and supplied an international market amongst the fair trade operators abroad with the assistance of Italian donors.
Ngezandlazethu, led by Sindi, showcased their work, taking along other local projects, on several prestige platforms, exhibited with the District Municipality and at events such as “One of a Kind”. The project was listed in the Crafters Travel guide to South Africa produced by Eskom, called Due South.
Sindi is an accomplished and passionate beadwork trainer along with other skills mentioned above. She receives many requests from younger women to learn handcraft skills which would generate revenue in the absence of employment opportunities. We have learnt many things on this journey, the most strategic of which is you need to create linkages between producers and the market and one needs to innovate and constantly produce fresh ideas and applications for the various skills, such as bead weaving and beading on textiles in the décor industry.
The Info Hub is assisting Sindi in the compilation of a professional skills provider profile and invites market role players in the public and private sectors, to get in touch with a view to training young women in the community and developing market linkages which lead to sustainable business.
Our lodges should be filled with locally produced décor and accessories should speak to the local talent from the community. The gift shops must overflow with quality, innovative items for travellers – not Chinese trinkets.
It starts with Skills transfer and networking – Let’s Talk