AURA QUE has been working with the Nepal Leprosy Trust (NLT) since 2006 when I first visited the workshop looking for fair trade producer groups to work with as research for my final year degree project. Since then I have visited them every year to sample and produce new products and have got to know many of the people who work there, really well over the years.
It has been our commitment over the years to improve their understanding of quality production, when I was living mostly in Kathmandu between 2009-2012, working directly with the workshop to develop their leather making skills, sourcing materials, improving their making quality as well as equipment and processes. This has been a challenging process, especially for AURA QUE, as a small business with limited resources, but this has enabled me to really get to know all the producers in the workshop over the years, seeing their children grow up, and improve their sampling capacity with other clients as well as AURA QUE.
The NLT office near Kathmandu is the headquarters of Nepal Leprosy Trust in Nepal, and provides solid support to the rest of the organization in Nepal, liaising with the Government, purchasing and sending supplies to Lalgadh, looking after patients that are travelling from Lalgadh to Kathmandu for specialist treatment. The office is also the base for the in-house leather handicraft workshop, set up to employ individuals who have suffered from leprosy or have someone in their family who has been affected, to give them opportunities through work. NLT is a member of Fair Trade Nepal and profits go to supporting NLT’s social welfare initiatives, and to the work at Lalgadh Leprosy Service Centre in South Nepal.
Recently the NLT Kathmandu office and workshop had to be partially demolished to accommodate a road-widening programme implemented by the Nepali Government. During 2016, building work went ahead to have cut 10ft from the entire 80ft frontage of the 4-storey headquarters building as well as extending it backwards by 5ft to reclaim some available space. This has been really unsettling for the workshop, as they had to move to the nearby longhouse premises temporarily, but as it is in Nepal, they just got on with it! And are now back in the main building, though waiting for the wider road to be finished to reduce the dust – this has been going on for a really long time... Having said that, there is now a rumour that the government wants to make the road even wider, which would destroy the building and render it useless. Fingers crossed this will not happen!
Laura Queening
Designer
AURA QUE