CULTURAL PRESERVATION
WEAVING TRADITION INTO SOUVENIRS
OLLANTAYTAMBO, PERU
Photo: Pamela Huber / Unsplash
The souvenirs you take home can have a big impact on a local community. On your next trip, choose a unique piece of culture by buying local handcrafted goods and ensure your purchase respects the time and skill required to create it. Near Cusco, Peru, you can find the woven work of Quechua artists in a fair-trade market.
What's
changing
Around the world, local artisan goods, such as high-quality handmade textiles and traditional garments, face stiff competition from mass-produced items found in tourist shops. To appeal to budget-conscious visitors, many souvenir vendors choose less expensive and often imported products for sale, which can undermine the ability of local artisans, often women, to maintain traditional crafts as a sustainable source of income.
What's already
possible
In Ollantaytambo, Peru, near the city of Cusco, a non-profit called Awamaki partners with Indigenous Quechua artisans to support women-led programs that preserve traditional skills like spinning, dyeing yarn and weaving heritage textiles.
Seizing
the opportunity
A member of the Fair Trade Federation, Awamaki sells handcrafted Peruvian goods online and through brick-and-mortar stores. Eight women-led rural cooperatives work with Awamaki to offer business education workshops for artisans and an accessible market for their wares. Awamaki negotiates fair prices for the items that honor the time, skill and materials required to create them.
Standout
tactic
Awamaki offers tourism packages for visitors that highlight Andean culture through cooking classes, language lessons and craft demonstrations. These activities are led by local Andean communities, while Awamaki handles the logistics of marketing and booking the experiences on behalf of the hosts.
How
it helps
When the COVID-19 pandemic halted in-person sales, Awamaki expanded its online presence to allow artisans access to an online market without needing to set up the technology on their own. This initiative tripled pre-pandemic online sales and gave artisans income while tourism was on hold. In 2022, Awamaki collaborated with 30 spinners, 15 knitters and 147 weavers across eight artisan cooperatives.
Diving
deeper
How can cooperatives remain viable and deal with a potential mismatch between what tourists demand in souvenirs and what traditional craftspeople create?
Increasing
impact
Organizations like Awamaki could invest in programs that recruit young artists and offer artist residencies to foster skills development and prevent the loss of traditional techniques.
Traveling
better
Travel is inherently carbon intensive. Whether you are taking a mini-break or an annual vacation, consider ways to minimize your impact by staying longer in one place, reconsidering how you travel to the destination, and supporting businesses that are working to make their community and the world a better place.
