Informed by his background and experience, Iyadema Kabasire brought together single mothers, mostly widows and together they started weaving baskets and other made in Rwanda handcrafts with an aim of ensuring better lives for them and their families.
Iyadema told The New Times what motivated him was his upbringing and life experiences.
"Growing up in a difficult life due to being raised by a single mother who struggled a lot to provide for me was my biggest motivation. I therefore not only wanted to support my mother but also her fellow widows so that they can be able to provide for their families. That is when we started a cooperative dubbed ‘ABISHYIZEHAMWE’ and so far we are growing,” he said.
Iyadema Kabasire, the 28-year old was born in Burundi Refugee Camp and raised in Rwanda, Bugesera District. He went to Espoir De L’ A.V.E.N.I.R Nyamata for primary school and joined Indangaburezi for secondary school. He never got a chance of joining the university but was keen on playing a role in bettering the lives of his mother and her counterparts.
He told this publication that he started with a tiny fund of Rwf 200,000 and with that he started with fifteen single mothers. Since then the women do Basket Weaving and other different home appliances and decorations.
Speaking to Doing Business, Chantal Mukamana, the President of this cooperative said that they have hope for the future.
"We were all struggling with life and providing for our families. Since ABISHYIZEHAMWE started, we can pay the health insurance and get some school fees of our children which was not easy at all before.”
Mukamana added that their biggest challenge is around access to the market since they only weave according to the orders. "Our biggest challenge is to get the customers whom we can sell our products to. We only operate according to orders, this still limits our market and we wish to have a stable working place so that we can make big signs of progress.”
With Rwf 300,000 which is their monthly income, they told this publication that after getting the raw materials, the income gets to be distributed amongst all the mothers according to everyone’s number of children.
The cooperative does Made in Rwanda and African culture-based handcrafts like; Baskets, earrings, necklaces, bracelets, coasters, wine holders, and other different home decorations. All of them are made with strands of sisal hand-dyed in various colors, then carefully wrapped around bunches of sweetgrass and sisal fibers.
Since all the women in this cooperative live and work from Ruhango District, they mostly sell from there and in Kigali. They revealed that they are using online selling platforms and they have started shipping globally.
"If we can get enough funds, we can do better than what we are doing and the number of women will increase from fifteen. We can even open up some new branches and have a specific showroom of our products,” said Kayisire Iyadema.