I feel very fortunate to be able to involve as a local volunteer through Volunteer Initiative Nepal (VIN) under the project called Women Empowerment of Kavresthali project. I started my volunteering on 7th June 2019. Initially, I had my orientation about the women empowerment with Luna Mam and Om Mam. I am very thankful to them for giving me different guidance and ideas about the related project. I worked as a volunteer with the cooperation with the International Volunteer named Liz Johnson who came here in Nepal from the United States. Despite a huge age gap between us, she is such an understanding and knowledgeable person and that helped both of us complete the project with we team spirit.
Initially, we visited different bag making groups, Jewellery making groups and doll making groups that helped us learn and understand about women empowerment project. We were so happy to see women in several businesses, they were motivated and enthusiastic about their own business. But their biggest dilemma is about marketing and they are unknown about whom to sell their products to. After visiting them, we found that women have to improve the quality of bags in order to find places for marketing and get a reasonable price for the products.
Throughout our (LIZ and mine) volunteering tenure in women empowerment project, we were following up women groups from two locations of Kavresthali project i.e., Thumka and Simleshwor. Women were on bag making jewelry making entrepreneurship project. We gave different ideas about the inventory like bookkeeping, record-keeping which would help them to keep records of their investment as well as predictions of future sales. In addition, the different ideas of socializing like promoting their products online through social apps like Facebook were introduced to them. For more ideas of the market, market research was also done in Thamel, Kathmandu which helped us to give some perspectives about the cost price of the products made by the women of Kavresthali. I am looking forward to their achievements in the future and impressed by their utilization of leisure time.
At last, I want to share that through this volunteering experience, my confidence level has been developed and I am very glad that I had an opportunity to interact with different women and overwhelmed by their welcoming behavior. All thanks to organization VIN and its entire team for providing an amazing platform to extend our helping hands. The effort, determination, passion, continuity, and efficiency by every individual of VIN are highly appreciated.
– Rejina Chaudhary, Local Volunteer, VIN
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