Handicrafts World News

Customs & tax sops for leather, handicraft and textile exporters
Economic Times, India

NEW DELHI: The government on Thursday reduced Customs duty on polyester staple fibre and polyester filament yarn from 7.5% to 5% and on other manmade fibres from 10% to 5%.

It also gave tax exemption on three more services besides enhancing interest subsidy to provide relief to exporters in identified sectors hit by the rupee’s appreciation. Sectors benefitting from the package include leather, handicrafts, marine products and textiles. (more…)

Handicraft industry hopes to nail 1.5 billion USD
Vietnam Economic Times, Vietnam

The handicraft industry targets 1.5 billion USD in export turnover by 2010, according to the Ministry of Industry and Trade.

Director of the ministry’s Trade Promotion Agency (Vietrade), Do Thang Hai, said more trade promotions would be carried out to achieve the goal.

A total of 2,017 handicraft villages exist in the country, most of them in the north and north central provinces, employing a total of 10 million craftmen. (more…)

Handicraft makers eye Japan
Viet Nam News, Vietnam

HA NOI — Handicraft producers and exporters expect to increasingly target the Japanese market, said the vice chairman of the Viet Nam Association of Craft Villages, Luu Duy Dan.

“Through the recent Viet Craft 2007 trade fair, we realised that Japan was a market of enormous potential for the handicrafts industry,” Dan said.
“Due to a lack of experience, we have not yet fully explored the potential of this market.” (more…)

Saved by the abaca angels
Inquirer.net, Philippines

GUINOBATAN, Albay–It has been a year since super typhoon Reming (international code name: Durian) brought Albay to its knees.
But, just like the province, entrepreneur Melinda Morante is slowly getting back on her feet.
Morante told the Inquirer that she lost P200,000 worth of handicrafts when flood waters swept into her stalls in the Guinobatan public market and another P500,000 when the floods ruined her inventory at the height of the typhoon in November last year. (more…)

Be proud of your roots: CM
Daily Express, Malaysia

Keningau: Chief Minister Datuk Musa Haji Aman said the young generation should be proud of their ancestry and accord due respect to those closely related to them.

It is even more challenging if they come from a large family requiring a complex family tree, he said, when addressing a gathering of the Gunsanad clan at the community centre here, Saturday evening.

Musa is linked to the Gunsanad clan through his grandparents on his mother’s side. He acknowledged that it was not easy to gather all the clan members at any one time, while commending those who took the pains to compile the family records towards safeguarding their ancestry, to an extent of covering some 95 per cent of the clan members. (more…)

Handicraft corp hedges on MCX
Dilip Kumar Jha / Mumbai November 23, 2007
Business Standard, India

State-run unit plans to hedge Rs 100 crore in precious metals

Handicrafts & Handlooms Exports Corporation of India (HHEC), a PSU under the Ministry of Textiles, has started hedging in bullion metals at the Multi Commodity Exchange (MCX). It has hedged Rs 13 crore in gold and silver over the last one month.

The handicraft promotion agency, which also imports precious metals, booked six tonnes of silver worth Rs 11 crore and 20 kg of gold worth Rs 2 crore on various contracts.

“We are trading only for taking physical delivery and nothing else,” said an official involved in trading. (more…)

ICEU for ending the role of intermediaries
GreaterKashmir.com (press release), India
Cooperative Movement

GK NEWS NETWORK

Srinagar, Nov 21: In connection with the cooperative week the Industrial Cooperative Employees’ Union, Handicraft Department Wednesday held a provincial level seminar at Miskeen Bagh here.
Farooq Ahmad Shah holding additional charge of joint registrar Cooperatives was presiding over the seminar.
A large number of artisans, cooperative employees, registrars and deputy registrars cooperatives Kashmir province participated in the seminar.
In his inaugural speech union president M Ashraf Wani made the participants aware of the cooperative movement, merging of the Induscos with the handicrafts department and the various artisan schemes. (more…)

Women’s groups better their handicraft skills
Fiji Times, Fiji

AS part of northern development, Minister for Women Adi Laufitu Malani has held talks with the Fiji American Chamber of Commerce for possible exporting of handicraft to the US by women in the North.

Adi Laufitu, who started the project to better the living standard of women in the North in terms of small revenue generating businesses, said handicraft to be exported would be made out of kuta, voivoi and wame.

“Consultations with the Fiji AMCHAM (American chamber of commerce) have started and we are hopeful they are fruitful. (more…)

INATO: Malaybalay’s Valdez Native Handicraft: but where’s the abaca?
Minda News, Philippines

MALAYBALAY CITY (MindaNews/19 November) — The local handicraft industry is losing business due to scarce supply of abaca, Bernadette Valdez, onwer of Malaybalay’s renowned Valdez Native Handicraft, said.

Although the demand for the products had been increasing, supply of woven abaca is going down, she said.

Her business, which started as a home-based cottage industry in the late 1980’s, is losing around P100,000 sales a month because of the supply problem, Valdez said. (more…)