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With the objective of continuing the conversation around the importance of the Social and Solidarity Economy for home-based workers around the world, HomeNet International hosted its second webinar on SSE on January 28, 2022.
Simel Esim, who leads ILO’s portfolio on cooperatives and the wider social and solidarity economy, gave the opening remarks and provided expert inputs on the values and principles around SSE, as well the opportunities MBO’s like HNI will have this year during the ILC’s general discussion which will also be on SSE.
shared how the organisation ventured into diverse products, like, bakery, homecare, rugs and doormat production, food and garment manufacturing, and later on created a community kitchen and urban gardening, in collaboration with with national and regional agencies, as well as the local government of Angono. The community- based model they’ve chosen for their organisation has developed food resiliency and income sustainability during the pandemic for their members..
shared how the organisation she helped create - Aster, Tadelech and Friends Enterprise is a small producer cooperative that makes washable and reusable sanitary pads and diapers. She mentioned that their products are mainly distributed to members of a community, as well as NGOs.
gave the example of Dura Sundari, a cooperative owned and managed by the ready made garment worker members of SEWA. The majority of women ready garment workers are home-based workers. The main objective of the cooperative is to provide threads and other raw materials to garment home-based workers at less than retail price. This cooperative has particularly been helpful during times of crisis like the pandemic.
different types of members who produce and sell varied products. They organize collectively, practicing solidarity from the acquisition of raw materials through collective purchases, productive arrangements in networks and collaborative marketing practicings.
mind set changes – from workers to owners and managers, working capital, enterprise development, leadership, access to raw materials, marketing, competition, policies and regulations and gender digital divide – access to technology.
Janhavi Dave, HNI International Coordinator, summarised how the different SSE models each organisation uses have social commonalities, such as the values, how the organisation benefits its members, particularly for recovery from COVID-19, as well as the environmental benefits. She mentioned that everyone spoke about solidarity – membership based organisations, democracy and having a people centred approach and economy. The reason these organisations came to be is because of a conscious choice of creating an organisation in order to have access to markets and self sustainability, despite the challenges.
In her Way Forward, Janhavi insisted this dialogue needs to continue through capacity building training on SSE and access to markets, knowledge sharing, peer learning and by advocating and participating in the upcoming ILC, especially by providing case studies of home-based workers and their SSE.
