Manjuara Begum, a resident of Baddipur Colony in the old Satkhira area of Satkhira Sadar Upazila. She was in trouble when her husband left her with two children and got married elsewhere. As she spends her days thinking about how to raise her two children and how to run the family, she came to learn the name of 'Bunon', a development agency, through a neighbor.
After that, Manjuara started making jute bags with training on handicrafts by the organisation 'Bunon'. She has not looked back since then. Now her children are going to good schools. She does not have to depend on anyone else to run the family anymore
The 'Bunon' development organisation is providing overall support to fulfill the dreams of hundreds of such women in Satkhira like Manjuara. The main goal and objective of this organization is to make the backward, helpless and neglected women of the country self-reliant by providing employment opportunities through various trainings in handicrafts.
Bunon, which started its journey six years ago, now has more than three and a half hundred women workers, who have been turned into skilled manpower with training from ‘Bunon’ at different times. The trained women are able to earn a living by working in various handicrafts including making jute bags, straw and palm leaf baskets and making clothes at home. Their various small and big dreams are being fulfilled with that money earned. On the other hand, these products made by grassroots women of Satkhira are being exported to different countries of the world. Foreign currency is coming from there.
Raushan Ara, a trainer in Bunon, said, "I have been working as a trainer in Bunon for 8 long years. I teach making jute bags. I have taught many women in Satkhira how to make bags. They are now self-sufficient.
We talked to one of the young ladies, Sharmin Sultana Rima, who is taking training to make jute bags from ‘Bunon’.
“I learned to make jute bags,” she said. In addition to studying, I make bags at home in my spare time. I pay for my education with the money I get from making bags. Earlier I had to take the cost of education from my father and now I can bear the cost of my own education.
Mamun Hasan Nasur, the founder and chief executive of Bunon, spoke about the overall activities of the organization. He said, "My main objective is to provide employment opportunities to the helpless, working women of Bangladesh by imparting handicraft training to them in various ways."
We are currently working on a variety of handicraft products. Among them we have jute bags, baskets made of straw and palm leaves and nakshi clothes. These products are made by our trained female staff with orders from various buyers outside the country and inside the country.
"We usually send handicraft products made by our employees to foreign countries," he added. Our products go to different countries of the world including Japan, Italy, German, US, London. Our jute products are especially sold in Italy and Japan.
Urging the government to expand the handicraft market a little more, he said, "If this handicraft market can be expanded in our country and if we can create a small position there, then we can train more women and make them skilled." We want to transform helpless, neglected women in every region of the country, not just Satkhira, into skilled manpower through training. We are ready to cooperate in this regard.
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