SABAH (SAARC Business Association of Home Based Workers) Nepal is a non-profit community based social-business organization which works towards strengthening the livelihoods of financially deprived and marginalized home based workers (HBW) of the informal sector in Nepal.
The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) works for regional integration in South Asia, through policy, dialogue, and engagement with the eight country governments. The SAARC Charter includes the uplift of the people in the region through innovative and significant initiatives, targeting poverty alleviation.
The Independent South Asia Commission on Poverty Alleviation (ISACPA) was established in order to exclusively address poverty-related issues and suggest strategies and measures for poverty alleviation. Subsequently, the SAARC Development Fund (SDF) was launched to meet this objective.
A concrete outcome of the meetings to articulate SAARC objectives and Millennium Development Goals (MDG), was a felt need to focus on the empowerment of women workers in the informal sector within the SAARC region.
In line with this outcome, the Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA), India, and HomeNet South Asia (HNSA) have been assigned a project by the SDF to carry out the mission of women’s empowerment in the region, by targeting poor & marginalized home-based women workers from the informal sector of all SAARC member states (except India). As one of the first goals of implementing this initiative, the home-based workers expressed a need to create a business organization, hence the SAARC Business Association of Home-based Workers (SABAH) was established.
The focus of this regional initiative was to establish Trade Facilitation Centres (TFCs) based on the model of the SEWA Trade Facilitation Centre.
SABAH Nepal identifies and brings together local HBWs/artisans in a group and empowers them through intensive skill enhancement trainings, leadership trainings, exposure visits, market awareness and other capacity building programs. They are also provided with a whole range of business development inputs ranging from market readiness, market linkages, market intelligence, quality standardization, R&D to product development.
Identification of women home based workers.
Design and Product Development, Enhancement of skills.
Establishment of community based enterprise, International and national market linkage.
SABAH (SAARC Business Association of Home Based Workers) Nepal is social business organisation which works toward strengthing the livelihoods of financially deprived and marginalized women homebased workers in Nepal. It has been zeroing in on its mission of empowering the rural and urban poor women working in informal sector through economic self-sufficiency. the organisation is completely owend and operated by its women members.
According to a survey, there are approximately 0.8 million home-based workers in Nepal, a majority of these being women. HBWs are mostly engaged in traditional industries like weaving, embroidery, woodcarving, tailoring and lack proper skills to directly participate in the market economy. They contribute significantly to their families, communities, and national economies, however, they remain uncounted, and remain invisible in national statistics. They are unprotected by the law and are often exploited.
Following the tragic 2015 earthquake. SABAH Nepal has been able to develop earthquake relief and recovery programs in partnership with the following members.
