An ethical decision
A jewellery project offers income opportunity for refugees, where such options are scarce and precarious, writes Aznim Ruhana Md Yusup
HOW SASIBAI KIMIS IS HELPING REFUGEES EARN A LIVING
ABEAUTIFUL object that is much desired will have no problems fetching a high price. But it’s not easy to create something that maximises the monetary exchange without shortchanging the consumer, while still respecting the people and resources that go into making it.
Companies that operate in this mindset do it as an ethical decision. Social enterprises, such as Earth Heir, take it further by engaging underprivileged communities.
The company recently released a jewellery collection called Made51 as part of a global initiative by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), where artisanal products are made by refugees to help them earn an income.
“The name is Made51 because 1951 is when the UN came out with the convention on the protection
of refugees,” says founder Sasibai Kimis during the launch.
“Malaysia, under the previous government, is not signed on to this convention so refugees here are not allowed to work.”
She adds: “We have about 150,000 refugees registered with UNHCR but the real number may be close to 200,000. They cannot work, have no rights and their children cannot go to school. I hope that with the new administration, they will be allowed to work legally.”
A STITCH IN TIME
The collection uses cross stitch designs as earrings, necklaces, bangles and cuffs. It sounds simple but the process is made more difficult by the products’ requirements.
Production manager Joanne Ng explains: “Cross stitch is not that uncommon so you think sourcing it should be easy. Not true. We worked with bigger cross stitch pieces first but these weren’t suitable for jewellery.”
“A lot of the women, especially those from Afghanistan, are familiar with embroidery but they’d never worked with a pattern. One refugee stitched her patterns
from right to left because their writing starts from the right. It had never occurred to me that I had to tell them to start from the left side.”
In addition to the small, delicate stitching, the threads also need to be neat on the underside of the fabric. This is to ensure the patterns can be precisely plated onto either 24-carat gold or 99 per cent silver. Despite these teething issues, Earth Heir is successful in producing the collection. The company is one of six social enterprises worldwide — and the only one in Malaysia — that works with UNHCR for this initiative.
It took about a year and a half between the start of the project to when the Earth Heir x Made51 was launched. The company works with 27 refugees, all women, from Afghanistan, Syria, Palestine, Iran and Myanmar.
This project is special because we want Malaysians to understand that refugees are not here to sponge off of us. They are willing to work hard and become meaningful contributors to society. Sasibai Kimis
religious, ethnic or economic persecution, says Sasibai.
“The refugees are paid at least the minimum wage,” she adds. “We calculate how long it takes to make each piece, such as the earring or the necklace, from the cross stitch to the setting of the jewellery.
“The hourly rate is RM6. If this cross stitch takes five hours to make they will get RM30. If they can do 30 cross stitch patterns a day, they’ll get paid 30 times that
amount. So what they earn is not limited to the minimum wage.”
Working with them this way skirts around the fact that these women cannot be legally employed. That said, Sasibai believes that allowing refugees, who are already in the country, to work lawfully is a far cheaper and kinder alternative than bringing in foreign workers.
“This project is special because we want Malaysians to understand that refugees are not here to sponge off of us. They are willing and want to work hard and become meaningful contributors to society,” she says.
“There is a certain xenophobia in regards to our treatment of refugees. But it’s better to be able to hire them legally than leaving them on their own where they may have to resort to crime or become victims of unscrupulous employers with no avenue for recourse.”
A lot of people’s identities are linked to their jobs and being able to earn a living allows people to live with dignity. It’s why Sasibai talks about the project as being able to help restore the sense of self determination of refugees who have been uprooted and displaced.
A HIGHER STANDARD OF BEAUTY
But none of these so-called charitable factors matter very much if the product isn’t good. It’s why Earth Heir has such high standards for the cross stitch to justify the price, which ranges from RM149 for a pair of earrings to RM299 for a bangle.
“Working with refugees is such an eye-opener,” says Sasibai. “They were making trinkets to sell at bazaars, which people pay RM5 to RM20 for, because what they were making doesn’t look like they were worth more than that.
“I’m so happy that we’ve created a product range made by refugees that looks classy and people are willing to spend a lot more money for them. It’s what we’re trying to do with all our products. It may be made by a needy person but that doesn’t mean they should get paid peanuts.”
Earth Heir’s mission with its artisanal products is to increase their value by incorporating good design that matches current tastes and trends. Added value can also come from innovations with the material or during the production stage.
“If the value doesn’t increase, you can’t help the people making them,” she says. “The consumers will not buy something they don’t think is well-made, welldesigned or of good quality. It all has to work while also ensuring the artisans are paid fairly and that the raw materials are sustainable.”
Sasibai takes the example of the mengkuang products that she has under Earth Heir. It includes traditional items like woven mats but also more modern selections such as totes and clutches in fashionable colours.
It takes two years for the mengkuang plant to grow before it can be harvested, while processing the leaves into strands takes two weeks. Weaving individual products may take another two weeks. So paying cheaply for these things is plain exploitation, she says.