Introduction to Fish Leather
Fish leather is a unique and sustainable alternative to traditional leather, made from the skins of fish that are typically discarded as waste. Fish leather is created using natural tanning and dyeing methods. This makes it a much more environmentally friendly option, with a much lower carbon footprint.
Fish leather has been used for centuries in countries such as Iceland, where it was originally developed as a way to preserve fish skins for clothing and footwear. Today, fish leather is gaining popularity as a fashion material due to its unique texture and appearance. It's also becoming more widely recognized as a sustainable alternative to traditional leather, which is a notoriously environmentally damaging industry.
How Fish Leather is Made
The process of creating fish leather is similar to the creation of any other leather. First, the fish skins must be cleaned and de-scaled,- this is done by women in Kisumu. It’s then soaked in a bath of water and salt to remove any remaining impurities. The skins are then tanned using natural plant-based tannins, which give the leather its characteristic texture and durability.
Once the tanning process is complete, the leather is ready to be dyed and finished. At this stage, natural dyes such as indigo or turmeric can be used to create a range of colors, from deep blues to bright yellows. Finally, the leather is treated with oils or waxes to give it a soft, supple texture that's suitable for use in clothing, bags, and other accessories.
The Sustainability of Fish Leather
One of the key benefits of using fish leather is its sustainability. Fish skins are a byproduct of the fishing industry, which means that they would otherwise go to waste. By using these skins to create leather, we're able to reduce the amount of waste generated by the industry and create a valuable new resource.
Fish leather is also much more environmentally friendly than traditional leather, which requires large amounts of water, energy, and chemicals to produce. By using natural tanning and dyeing methods, we're able to create a product that has a much lower carbon footprint and is less damaging to the environment.
The Story Behind Our Handmade Fish Leather Wallets
Ecodunia fish leather wallets are handmade in Kenya by a team of skilled artisans. We work with local fish people in Kisumu to source our fish skins, which are then tanned and dyed using traditional methods. The wallets themselves are fashioned from high-quality leather and feature a range of unique, minimalist designs and colors.
What makes our wallets truly special, however, is the fact that they're part of a larger social enterprise. Our brand is committed to creating sustainable, ethical jobs in Kenya, and we work closely with our artisans to provide fair wages and safe working conditions. By purchasing one of our wallets, you're not just getting a beautiful and sustainable accessory – you're also supporting a community of skilled artisans and helping to promote ethical fashion practices.
The Benefits of Using Fish Leather
In addition to its sustainability benefits, fish leather also has a number of unique characteristics that make it an excellent material for accessories such as wallets. For one, it's incredibly durable and long-lasting, meaning that your wallet will stand up to years of use without showing signs of wear and tear.
Fish leather also has a unique texture and appearance that sets it apart from traditional leathers. The scales and patterns on the leather give it a distinctive look that's both eye-catching and stylish. Finally, fish leather is incredibly versatile, and can be used to create a range of accessories, from wallets to purses to belts and beyond.
The Future of Fish Leather
As the fashion industry continues to move towards more sustainable and ethical practices, we believe that fish leather will become an increasingly popular material choice. Its unique texture and appearance, combined with its sustainability benefits, make it an excellent alternative to traditional leather.
We're proud to be at the forefront of this movement, creating high-quality, handmade fish leather wallets that are both stylish and sustainable. We believe that by promoting ethical fashion practices and supporting local communities, we can create a better future for everyone.
Where to Purchase Handmade Fish Leather Wallets
If you're interested in purchasing one of our handmade fish leather wallets, you can find them on our website. We offer a range of colors and designs to choose from, so you're sure to find one that suits your style.
How to Care for Your Fish Leather Wallet
Caring for your fish leather wallet is relatively simple. To keep it looking its best, avoid exposing it to direct sunlight or heat, as this can cause the leather to dry out and crack. If your wallet becomes dirty, simply wipe it down with a damp cloth and mild soap. Avoid using harsh chemicals or solvents, as these can damage the leather.
Conclusion
We hope that this article has given you a better understanding of the world of fish leather, and why it's such an exciting and sustainable material choice. By choosing to use fish leather in our handmade wallets, we're able to create a product that's both stylish and socially responsible. We believe that by promoting ethical fashion practices and supporting local communities, we can create a better future for everyone.
]]>'Black Gold' has stuck with me ever since I watched it years ago. It is a documentary film about an Ethiopian union leader, Tadesse Meskela who travels the world trying to find a fairer buyer on behalf of his fellow coffee farmers'. To say the least, it shaped my ambitions while I was studying International Development at UCLA years ago. And even re-watching it today as a social entrepreneur refilled my vein with superior grade caffeine.
Coffee gives you a head start to the day. As one of the Italian baristas interviewed in the film says, 'Without it we are all miserable'. How about the misery of coffee farmers in the original home of coffee?
What the regular coffee drinker in America feels on going a day without coffee cannot compare to how the farmers feel as they work in their coffee farms.
One picture that I can never get out of my mind is of the farmers' reaction to Tadesse's revelation to them: in effect, they would have to save 100% of their wages for 10 days in order for them to afford just 1 cup of coffee.
In the film, one Starbucks' employee brags about how fast their empire is growing. This begs the question if the beverage is black gold, how come the ones who pour their sweat to bring it off the soil die poorer?
The losses that farmers started making since the collapse of the original International Coffee Agreement led them to consider other crops. But which exactly could, say, replace what gives Ethiopia 67% of its export earnings?
A few farmers cut down the generations-old coffee trees and started experimenting with the other stimulant, khat. The market for this is limited to a few countries in the Horn of Africa and the Middle East. There is no way it can provide the farmers with a sustainable source of income either.
Thus the best shot at improved lifestyles for about 74, 000 farmers was for Tadesse to find fairer business partners. As the film shows, he did meet with a few successes. He got Ethiopian coffee on the supermarket shelves and participated in the various fairs. He may not have played the Goliath that is headed by the Nestle's and Mary Lee's, but his efforts paid off as the film ended with him returning to the cooperative members their first premiums.
Black Gold from Speakit on Vimeo.
A quick Google search brings up the many more accomplishments that came from one person's dream of a life of dignity for his fellow workers. Not only did the union he led build schools and hospitals in the Ethiopian villages, this year they are set to open a $1.5M coffee roasting and packaging complex.
While the greater threat right now to these coffee farmers is climate change -also a beast fathered by greed, there is hope. Tadesse opened our eyes to how much the world can change when we take back our power as labor and consumers and believe that we are not too small to set the terms of engagement.
Image credit:
<a href="https://www.freepik.com/free-photo/creative-african-american-bearded-guy-with-afro-hairstyle-glasses-red-hoodie-creating-new-song-standing-thoughtful-pose-touching-chin-looking-dreamy-focused-upper-right-corner-thinking_17612687.htm#query=thoughts&position=10&from_view=search&track=sph">Image by cookie_studio</a> on Freepik
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TEDTalks are a great resource for anyone in search of ideas worth practicing. TED hosts a great variety of videos, but it’s easy to be at a loss for where to start your educational binge. Below are a few TEDTalks about empowerment and equality vis a vis Africa.
Kakenya Ntaiya is a Kenyan educator and activist. She was betrothed to be married at the tender age of 5 after undergoing FGM as per Maasai tradition. By her own wits as a teen, she managed to negotiate her way out of that marriage though, and do what no other woman from her community had done before: study abroad.
After earning her PhD in education from the University of Pittsburgh, Kakenya returned to her community to facilitate vulnerable girls’ education and empowerment. She founded Kakenya’s Dream, which works towards ending harmful traditional practices in Kenya. She has earned several awards, including the 2018 Break The Silence McGrath Activist Award.
William Kamkwamba is the Malawian innovator whose story was turned into the Netflix film “The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind”. He was just 14 years old when he built his family an electricity generating windmill from bicycle spare parts. The only technical education he had had by then was just an old library book.
His story is similar to Richard Turere’s who also has a TEDTalk on how a simple invention helped cure the human wildlife conflict that was perennial in his area.
The story we tell about ourselves, whether by ourselves or by others, affects how we live. In this TEDTalk the Nigerian writer Chimamanda charts the journey of how she came to see the danger of a single story.
Chimamanda builds on the same ideas explored by the late BBC journalist Komla Dumor in his TEDxEuston talk “Telling the African Story”.
Ngozi Okonjo is a distinguished Nigerian economist and development expert. She has served in key positions at the World Bank, Gavi, the Rockefeller Foundation and the Center for Global Development.
While serving as Finance Minister in Nigeria, she helped found African Risk Capacity, a specialized agency of the African Union to help member states prepare for and respond to extreme weather events and natural disasters.
This Talk speaks on how this agency can serve as a model to keep Africa rising.
Teva is an American social worker. She has experience running non-profits catering for the homeless and refugees. She transformed Growing Home, a small shelter program from serving 30 families into a comprehensive anti-poverty organisation that currently serves 4,600 families annually.
While Teva’s work and Talk are not about Africa, the ideas and principles apply.
Andrew Youn founded The One Acre Fund in Kenya along with John Gachunga. The One Acre Fund makes low-interest loans and provides agricultural education to East African farmers. It creates groups of 200 farmers who get better prices by buying modern commercial seeds in bulk. The fund also provides crop insurance and claims that on average farmers working with them double their profits in a single planting season.
In this Talk he discusses how the majority of the world’s poor are farmers and offers practical ideas about how this situation can be changed.
While Youn’s work has been very controversial and my opinion on him and his work is very conflicted, the vision he lays out in this TEDTalk is very important in the way we think about small scale farming in Africa.
Simon Moss is a campaigning and community education expert. He has contributed on development issues at some of the world's leading conferences including the G20, the World Economic Forum and the Clinton Global Initiative. He is the co-founder of the Global Poverty Project, an education and campaigning organisation working towards the end of extreme poverty, and wrote the ground-breaking 1.4 Billion Reasons presentation, which has been delivered 750+ times to 100,000+ people since 2009.
In this Talk he talks about how aid and volunteering cannot help end poverty, and gives ideas on how each individual can contribute to the empowerment of their fellow humans in any part of the world.
I found much inspiration from this collection of ideas on ending inequality and starting on a journey of empowerment. I hope you did too. If I left any talk out, please leave a comment below.
]]>Ecodunia is among the pioneers that are turning trash into dignified work and sustainable products by tanning fish skins and making fish leather wallets. We are a small part of a global effort to save the environment by making great products from what would otherwise be thrown away.
Globally, seafood consumption has more than doubled in the past 50 years, to over 20 kg per capita per year according to the European Commission. As demand for seafood rises, the sustainability of fish stock has become an ever more pressing issue. Here in Kenya, Fish is a huge part of people's diet, especially for the communities living in the lake region. The commodity is also on high demand in cities and towns across the country. Fisheries have been established across the country to meet the ever-increasing demand for fish. The result is huge piles of fish waste around fisheries and lakes, which pollute the environment.
The reality is that many traders in the fish business are small-scale traders. Their greatest concern is feeding their families, regardless of the impact. Communities have to deal with the piles of waste that now seem normal. Unfortunately, the waste management system in Kenya is inefficient.
And that’s where we come in. One wallet at a time, we’re taking their fish skins, tanning them, dying them and making wallets. While government authorities deal with the burden of plastic waste, we are doing our part by turning fish waste into beautiful, durable products - and sustainable businesses.
Most fish sold in markets is filleted - leaving bones and skins as a by-product, which has opened up the opportunity for innovative solutions.
Some entrepreneurs have been taking some of the fillet left-overs for animal feed by making fish meals. Some have been using the scales for fertilizer. However, all these industries have not been able to keep up with the need for innovative ways to use all of the fish. And that’s where we come in. For us, fish skin is a raw material with amazing potential for useful, beautiful and sustainable products. Ecodunia turns fish skin into leather, which is then used to make unique wallets and bags.
Salt is used to treat any bacteria during the process before tanning the fish skins. Then, our fresh fish skins go through a thorough tanning process to make the leather, just as any other hide would. Soaking the raw fish skin in plant extracts strengthens it and removes the bad odor. The final stages include dying the skins and then pressing them so they have a beautiful, smooth finish - perfect for wallets.
The commitment of Ecodunia is to ensure that the final products meet international standards. We work hand in hand with a government agency for research and development, so that we can ensure that all processes are done in accordance with best practices, including environmental sustainability and producing the highest-quality fish leather.
Ecodunia is currently producing fish leather wallets. However, fish skin does more than product wallets. In the future, we plan to expand our product line to include shoes, belts, purses, jackets, and sandals.
The use of fish skin to make sustainable products is just one way of preserving our natural environment. Our hopes and expectations are that our products will be an example and inspiration to others to think of creative ways of using waste.
The use of fish skin is still at the early stages of development and use. But as the demand for fish as a healthy source of proteins continues to rise, so will the need to innovate new ways to make the entire industry more sustainable.
We are doing our part by making amazing fish leather products. Ecodunia is excited to be a part of this exciting movement - and a pioneer of fish leather and fish leather products. Our mission is to bring useful, unique and sustainable products to the international marketplace, while providing dignified work to people who have been overlooked by the global economy. Fish leather wallets is one of the ways we are living up to our mission.
]]>At Ecodunia, we are committed to creating products that are sustainable. Our bags are hand made from 100% organic cotton. Even our packaging is recycled and handmade. A small company on the west side of Nairobi uses 100% recycled paper and then hand cuts, glues, folds and prints the packaging for our bags. We want to have the smallest carbon footprint possible.
And yes, even in our shipping we have found a way to be as responsible as possible in our shipping. We work with another local company that takes our boxes for shipping to the US and waits for a plane that has cargo space available. First, this allows us to ship more affordably and secondly, it means that we are not adding to the number of flights from Kenya to the US.
When the plane is just hours from take-off, they let us know that they have space available. And then our products go on a plane that was going anyway with extra space. It’s a little like hitchhiking for our products.
But there’s a catch to our commitment to being as sustainable as we can.
For our last shipment, we debated if we should wrap all of our boxes in plastic so that, in the event that they got wet, they would be protected. But we are committed to reducing waste and not using plastics, so after deliberation, we decided against it.
As fate would have it, the boxes were left in the rain on one step along the way and hundreds of dollars of product and recycled packaging was ruined. Even worse, we had customers depending on that product being delivered and now we are held up in a challenging situation.
For a small start-up, a social enterprise like Ecodunia, this was a very hard blow. We are not in a position to absorb these kinds of losses, and yet - we are also committed to our principles. It’s in the hardest times that our beliefs are tested.
So, while we remain committed to the founding ideals of our company, we would be remiss not to recognize that even some bad things, like plastic bags, have some very good and redeeming qualities. Plastic bags are great. Unfortunately, with that great comes to other costs. And even more unfortunate, without the plastic, we still sometimes end up with the waste we are so committed to eradicating.
Plastic pollution is still a nightmare. From clogged drainage systems to massive garbage heaps, the effects are tangible. Governments across the globe have come up with laws to control plastic pollution. Such efforts can only bear fruit if we all take part.
Think about it. Plastic bags take about 1,000 years to degrade. The consequences of your decisions stretch that far into the future. We rarely think that far when disposing of plastic bags.
Let us look at more reasons why everyone should switch to eco-friendly bags:
Brands such as Ecodunia have made it easy for consumers to access sustainable bags when shopping. You can order for an eco-friendly bag online and it will be delivered to your doorstep. In other words, you have no excuse to pick a plastic shopping bag.
Many stores provide such bags to shoppers at different prices. It just takes a simple yet important decision from you to pick an eco-friendly bag.
We shop almost every day, especially for food products. Hence, most homes have a drawer or box full of shopping bags. The bags do not only take up space but also make the room look disorganized. The pile grows every day unless you do something about it.
Eco-friendly bags are washable and reusable. You do not need to buy a new bag every time you go shopping. Pick materials that are easy to wash and keep clean. A few bags of different sizes will keep you going for months or even years, and enjoy a clean and happy home.
Eco-friendly bags are strong and easy to carry compared to conventional shopping bags. You will appreciate a sustainable bag when lifting heavy shopping. Even the best plastic bags sometimes give way. You do not want the embarrassment of spilled shopping.
In addition, the bags are comfortable on your hands and shoulders. On the days you choose to walk to the store, eco-friendly shopping bags are your best pick. You will enjoy your shopping trip and have an easy walk back home
Who said shopping bags should be boring? You can spend your money in style, even if you are just picking fresh produce from your local store. The market for bags has expanded to include great designs and prints.
The prices differ across brands and designs. You will definitely find a bag that suits your taste and budget. Remember that the bags are strong and reusable. You save money in the long-term when you buy from top brands.
Campaigns to control plastic pollution sometimes make us uneasy. Instead of worrying about the wrong decisions you made in the past, start making the right decisions. You cannot solve the pollution puzzle alone but your decision counts.
By choosing sustainable products, you have the peace of mind knowing that you are playing your role. Future generations will benefit from your decisions as a responsible consumer.
Did you know that a pleasant environment has an effect on your mental health? It is not just about easing your conscience. When you switch to sustainable products, you are investing in your mental health and quality of life.
Final thoughts!
It is easy to pass on the responsibility of a clean environment to the next person. Blaming government authorities is equally easy. However, each decision to buy sustainable products counts in the fight against plastic pollution. Start making the right decisions today and encourage others to do the same.
]]>Kagame says more than 90 per cent of Rwandans have insurance coverage. We are making significant improvements in Africa #ecodunia #progress #sustainable #equality
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