Nepal Avocado Farming and Industries P. Ltd and Aakansha Creation P. Ltd, Cottage and Small Industries have signed an agreement to create jobs for women displaced by landslides and floods in the district of Sindhupalchowk. The social campaign of Aakansha Creation’s Tekka Initiatives will lead the project in collaboration with the local ward office.  The campaign will organize trainings for the displaced women on making soft toys by crochet. Crochet is a process of creating textiles by using a crochet hook to interlock loops of yarn, thread or strands of other materials.

The materials used for making the soft toys and the training will be provided free of cost. Once the training is complete, they will be provided an opportunity for employment to produce soft toys for AVO Nepal. The concept is built with an aim of improving the livelihood of displaced women and helping them become economically independent. These toys will be sold via different outlets throughout Nepal, India and Japan.

“It’s our absolute pleasure to collaborate with Tekka Initiative to start something inspiring”, said the Co-Founder and Director of AVO Nepal Ms. Sudixya Adhikari. She further adds, “Our company is focused on promoting Nepali Avocado and its various sub-categories of products. To launch our brand with soft toys is not only a part of our business strategy but also our intention to help marginalized communities, especially women. We were looking for a company that worked with women and found Tekka Initiative as a perfect match for our objective”.

The Managing Director of Aakansha Creation said, “We plan to offer training on crochet and supply materials free of cost”. Once they complete the training, we will use their skills to manufacture soft toys with an intention to provide jobs to at-least 100 women in the next six months”.

Battered by a series of natural disasters in July and August that caused huge loss to life and property, Sindhupalchowk was declared a crisis-hit region through government announcement on 24 September, 2020. The government is now planning to reconstruct the disaster-ravaged physical infrastructure in the district with the assistance of World Bank for NPR. 6 billion.

The reconstruction will be carried out through the National Disaster Risk Mitigation and Management Authority. As per data from the Sindhupalchowk District Administration Office, 75 people died, 39 were missing and some 130 houses were completely destroyed in the past three months by floods and landslides at Ghumthang of Bahrabise Municipality and Lidi of Jugal Rural Municipality in the district.

According to authorities in the district, more than 3,000 families at the 11 local bodies need to be relocated owing to the risk of floods and landslides, the Himalayan times, Nepal English daily reported.