Peace Corps Morocco and the Investment in Artisan’s Cooperatives : Harper College

During my recent travels to Morocco, I had the privilege to visit a women’s weaving cooperative that was started by local Moroccans with the help of a former Peace Corps volunteer. Several of my fellow faculty members and I were given a lesson in pile rug weaving. Over the next few hours, we worked away making our small but brightly colored fragment rugs. They made a very nice, personal souvenir to take home with us.

Small instrument used for weaving rugs, tightly wound wires on a wooden block — Initial setup for the rug weaving

As I researched the cooperative for this blog, I learned that the weaving cooperative that I went to is only one group within a larger collective called The Anou and it doesn’t just deal with fiber crafts, but includes wooden, leather and metal housewares, painted art and jewelry. And the individual cooperatives are not made up of only women either, several of them have male members.

Room wth vats of dye and yarn hanging on the walls — Yarn dying station

Cooperatives in Morocco have a deep connection with the US Peace Corps with their beginning in 1999. The first cooperative was called the Golden Buttons that made handmade silk buttons that were used to adorn traditional clothing. Artist Amina Yabis started the Golden Buttons with the help of the Peace Corps and then a year later started the Cherry Buttons Cooperative to deal with the business side of the silk button trade. These cooperatives give the artistic women a safe way to make their own money.

A man weaving using an old indigenous technique — David Antonides, another member of the Field Seminar cohort, working on his rug

The Anou Cooperative is run by over 600 artisans from across Morocco, though most are centered around the city of Fez. What is so interesting about this type of cooperative is that instead of having a middleman that buys the artists’ finished products typically at a low price and then sells them at a higher price pocketing the profit, the Anou cooperative is owned by the artists themselves. This way about 80% of the profit goes directly to the artists and 20% goes to the cooperative.

A woman weeaving using an indigenous technique — Karen, a member of the Field Seminar cohort, weaving at her station

The Anou Cooperative is also taking things to a new technological level by helping Moroccan artisans to sell their handmade items in an online marketplace directly to buyers all around the world.

A rug nearly complete on the ancient weaving instrument — Nearly finished project

As a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer myself (RPCV, Zimbabwe 1994), I love the idea of volunteers helping community members become more economically self-sufficient, especially women. The main objective of the Peace Corps is not to take over the operations of the developing project but to help provide the connections, training and sometimes the money so that cooperative members can continue the venture long after the volunteer's service has ended.