Our Difference

Fair Trade

• Saoban creates opportunities for economically and socially marginalised producers in Laos and operates on the principles of ‘fair trade’
• Saoban ensures fair pay and working conditions for village artisans to provide rural families and communities the opportunity for a dignified and sustainable livelihood
• Saoban is an active member of Fair Trade Laos
• Saoban imbibes the World Fair Trade Organization’s 10 Standards that Fair Trade Organizations must follow in their day-to-day work

Saoban builds capacity

Working with Saoban opens up a range of opportunities through capacity building and training. Artisans participate in:

• Technical training, design advice and product development
• Micro-loans to initiate or expand production
• Capacity building in management and organizational skills, especially in group formation, group regulations, and roles for group leaders and members
• Advice about business management, including simple cost analysis and pricing, quality control, and product grading
• Market information and exchanges through cross visits among artisan’ groups to broaden experience, techniques, and product range
• Connections to retail outlets in Vientiane and international wholesale clients

Saoban supports and empowers rural communities

• Villagers organise artisan groups or cooperatives (mostly women led), strengthening local communities
• In 2011, Saoban is working with over 300 artisans in 14 producer groups across five provinces of Laos
• Artisans and groups build their own businesses, rather than work for a middleman, and their profits stay in their communities
• Saoban enables village based home production, reducing the rising trend of labour migration and resultant social issues of trafficking, prostitution and HIV/AIDS
• Artisans can choose their own hours allowing the flexibility to fit production in with the rhythm of their family and farming lives

Saoban products are eco-friendly

• Saoban supports sustainable practices by using raw materials from sustainably managed sources or by using waste materials
• Saoban promotes the use of natural dyes, reviving traditional indigenous knowledge
• Saoban artisans create products from local bamboo, silk and organically grown cotton, using hand-powered techniques, the way the Lao people have for centuries

Saoban protects children

• There is no child labour in the production of Saoban products
• Women join Saoban programs do so on the condition that they vaccinate all children and send them to school at least until the end of primary school
• To preserve cultural heritage, Saoban encourages artisans to hand down their skills and crafts to the next generation

Saoban preserves cultural heritage

• Laos has a rich heritage of craft production but the pressure of modern life and the availability of cheap factory made imports have resulted in Lao people giving up their crafts and their rural livelihoods. As a result, many of the crafts of Laos are vanishing art forms.
• Saoban is passionate about reviving traditional crafts which form the cultural identity and heritage of Laos
• Saoban harnesses the existing resource of talented artisans and crafts people and helps them to move from subsistence production to more sustainable livelihoods.