Over the years , it has been realized that group members could not substantially raise their income levels by production activities due to factors such as quality, price and stiff competition in the market. Therefore, CRUSADE restricted skill training in activities such as tailoring, embroidery and kalamkari ( hand drawing using vegetable dyes ) which widened employment opportunity to women trained.

Kalamkari unit was started with start up funds from West DEN in UK which also provided funds for training the trainer. The trainer underwent training in a institution in the city and she in turn trained 6 women members.Two of them are engaged in producing greeting cards, bags , file folders , wall hangings , cushion covers , etc AVI and TAMWED, other charities in UK, are researching on market in UK for the products. During 2007-08 trained women members have earned around Rs 44,000 by supplying items to UK and by supplying file folders for training programmes held locally.

 

TAMWED was a charity set up in Devon in UK in response to TSUNAMI tragedy in South India. TAMWED Secretary Oz Osborne has conducted a workshop on ‘Sustainable Community Project’ in Chennai in December, 2008 in which around 10 NGO staff involved in enterprises promotion participated. TAMWED Secretary also facilitated a discussion on climate change for a day in which experts on the subject gave inputs on the problem to NGO leaders.