Promoting women skill and development to alleviate rural lifestyles

The three-month session includes hands-on skills of making marble and mosaic inlays.

ISLAMABAD:

More than 60 female artisans will be trained to develop an entrepreneurial culture and a sense of self-employment among them, and to alleviate poverty in remote areas.

This was stated by Ihsanullah Khan, Pakistan Stone Development Company (PASDEC) Chief Executive Officer. He was speaking at the inauguration ceremony of the gender training session, which aims to hold a series of marble and mosaic inlays’ sessions to promote the women skill development and entrepreneurship culture in the country.

Marble mosaic work is renowned not only for its design and aesthetic beauty, but also because each product is made by intricate handwork, he said.  Mosaic is the art of decoration with small pieces of stone, coloured glass or other material. The initiative aims to promote the enterprise household models to support female enterprising activities for generating employment in rural labour market, and produce value-added products of marble mosaic which is used in construction, furniture and interior decoration equally, he added.

He said the total marble exports in 2007 were US$ 23 million, while in 2011, just the marble handicrafts, inlay and mosaic exports contributed US$ 24 million to the exports.

Moreover, he said the objective of the training is to strengthen the cluster by providing skilled work force for production of high quality value-added product of Mosaic, Handicraft & Inlay so that enterprises and individuals of this cluster are more prepared to catch all opportunities.





Published in The Express Tribune, August 3^rd, 2011.