HANDICRAFTS
In Need of Invigoration
T
Economic and Political Weekly September 16, 2006
traditional methods and motifs or reinventing them according to market trends have won out at different times. In advanced industrialised countries, traditional craftspersons have all but disappeared, giving way to the practice of studio art that in its price and emphasis on individuality and decorative function is a different animal altogether. Still, the range and diversity of India’s traditional crafts is unparalleled, and they continue to be mostly family-oriented occupations concentrated in rural areas. However, development and promotion of the handicrafts sector has remained a matter of low priority, except for some important exceptions in the NGO sector and the efforts of some state governments.
Though it is difficult to get estimates of domestic sales of handicrafts, export growth in the last two years, in dollar terms have grown by about 10 per cent each year. Countries such as China and South Korea have successfully converted traditional handicrafts into private industries that employ a fair degree of mechanisation. China, by deploying aggressive marketing techniques and timely state funding, has been able to secure a 17 per cent share of world trade in this sector, whereas India has about a 2 per cent share. In India, woodwares, embroidered and crochet products, shawls and jewellery have shown impressive growth in recent years. There is still lack of clarity in India about which way development in the sector should proceed and government programmes remain limited to skill upgradation, training and extension, etc, implemented mostly through NGOs. The lack of producer groups and the presence of intermediaries mean that artisans are not able to secure the level of income that would be possible if they were directly linked to markets. Various ideas have been mooted in terms of innovating new structures to encourage entrepreneurship among artisans, such as providing them with business development support to set up small firms, but they remain as yet untested on the ground. (The closest that the present structure comes to accommodating such clusters is the formation of self-help groups.) Most important in this respect would be the financial and marketing support the state would be able to provide.
Unfortunately, this is exactly where government schemes have been the weakest. Handicrafts are a state subject in which the central government provides supplementary support. According to a recent report of the parliamentary Committee on Empowerment of Women, the Artisans Credit Cards scheme run by the centre through banks and meant to provide funds for working capital and investment has been particularly dismal: 37,369 cards were issued until 2004-05, a minuscule number considering the population the scheme is to cater to. Similarly, marketing efforts are limited to organising craft bazaars in urban centres rather than linking producers to wider market trends or networks. The urban ‘haat’ concept launched in 1999-2000 that was to provide artisans a ready marketplace in urban areas on a rotation basis has been a relative non-starter: only five such haats are now operational. A general underutilisation of funds by the ministry of textiles for the handicrafts sector also persists as a problem. Moreover, traditional craft occupations are peopled by a large number of scheduled tribes, scheduled castes, backward castes and women. Yet intervention programmes remain caste and gender blind. For now, the government needs to undertake a comprehensive survey of the state of handicrafts in the country and devise specific interventions in those areas that employ the largest number of artisans, such as textiles and bamboo and cane. The larger challenge, perhaps, will be to bring the artisan back into the design process, not to mention policy-making, so that the space for creativity and cultural expression remains an integral part of “craft”.
EPWEconomic and Political Weekly September 16, 2006
