Consolate
After a memorandum of understanding between the Ugandan Government and United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) to grow trade and industry was signed in 1999, an integrated program (TEXDA) with a number of projects that included textile production was established. The focus of this initiative was to promote Skills upgrade, Garment construction, Product development, Hand loom weaving and Surface Design with the core courses of Business Management and Basic Design.
In 2006, Textile Development Agency added basic intermediate and advanced levels of training to their scope of work, birthing a business side. It is however in 2009 that it was officially registered as a Limited by guarantee. ‘’ At this point, the UNIDO support was coming to an end and TEXDA’s sustainability was questionable. It was then registered as a business under Uganda Registration Services Bureau (URSB) ending the NGO status it had held since its inception.’’ Shares Angela Kirabo, the current Executive Director — TEXDA.
With the new status, TEXDA became a boutique company focused on niche products and valued customers. They mainly cater to the needs of a particular group of customers who value hand-made products, individuality and sustainably sourced materials, and their attention to detail has helped them deliver satisfaction to many customers.
‘’ The business is intertwined. We train individuals to make our niche products and also do our own production in the same area. From the running hand-woven fabrics, we make a large array of items such as tablecloths, napkins, placemats, bedcovers, kikoys/sarongs, throws, scarves, baby wraps, bags, purses, etc.’’
When it comes to the clientele, Angela intimates that they have a diverse group of people they market and sell to.’’ For starters, on the local market our biggest customers are the Safari lodges within the National Game Parks. We work with a designer from those lodges to make something tailor-made to their specific needs. We then produce the design accordingly. For this type of client, we make staff uniforms, bedspreads, curtains, etc.
We also have walk –in clients and for that category, the biggest number are expatriates who love the feel of the hand woven fabric. There is an option for the machine woven ones that are made in Kenya. They are however cheaper compared to the hand woven ones we make here at TEXDA. The texture of the latter is richer and is its biggest selling point.
We have a number of clients on the International market. Our products are marketed primarily to the international markets, namely EU and USA. At the moment, one of our biggest clients in Canada consistently orders at least 400 pieces of the ‘kikoyi’ fabric each month. We also have a Danish customer who makes baby wraps and orders fabric from us. In the USA, we have a client that prefers the Ugandan hand woven cotton to make their products and orders from us seasonally.
Angela believes that TEXDA has been able to build a reputation of excellence especially among their clients due to the fact that their textiles are certified. ‘’Our textiles are AGOA legible. That puts us on another level of excellence which is really exciting.’’
Most significant Contributions
We have been training individuals and groups of people since 1999.At the moment, there are University students from Makerere, Ndejje among others who come in for textile training and internship opportunities. All our efforts to this cause have gained us credible recognition from entities like the Royal Institute Business Technical Education forum in Mengo who awarded us a certificate of appreciation.
Today over 1050 trainees have followed courses at TEXDA and as a result they manage businesses that not only generate income, but also create traineeships and employment for others. Many report that the courses helped them;
TEXDA is working on an ‘Under garments’ project where we are producing pieces for women in resettlement camps and the pilot project is covering Adjumani, Nakivaale and Mwanja. The 100% Ugandan fabric made pieces have somehow already made their way onto the Ugandan garment market which is great for us given the fact that the project was meant to help refugees. There is also an organization called Musinji East Africa that is happy to market our under garments abroad.
On several occasions, we teach and train people around our community for free. We do not expect them to pay which is more of paying it forward to build our community jointly.
It is such a huge milestone to be in a position where the business sustains itself looking at how we started as a funded NGO. With this growth, we are able to pay ground rent, salaries, and wages for the artisans, afford utilities etc.
One of our biggest and most proud achievements is making the costumes for the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) award winning film ‘The Last King of Scotland (2007)’ filmed in Kampala.
TEXDA uses locally sourced cotton and silk yarns for their fabrics that can be traced back to local farms in the countryside which helps sustain the livelihood of many Ugandan cotton growers.
We, at TEXDA, understand our role in society. We strive to create and maintain jobs for people who work diligently and responsibly to earn a good living, while being mindful of our environment.
When people experience our products, they get surprised that such quality work can be made in Uganda. Some of our international clients even keep our label, ‘TEXDA. Made in Uganda’. This pushes and markets our brand worldwide.
Challenges
The biggest challenge is Ugandans’ attitude towards Hands on skills. That alone is a challenge nationally because most parents look at these skills as a last resort. The enrollment is not that high and when they do enroll their children, the dropout rate is high. They do not stay that long. Not many of the people we train invest their skills into this kind of business, so we end up focusing on the refugees who are desperate to learn and earn a living.
Sometimes we deal with clients who place very big orders without making a deposit for the initial production phase which is really a big challenge. We have to maneuver on our own using whatever savings we have or even looking elsewhere to make these orders. If you do not have collateral to give the bank for a loan, it is nearly impossible to fulfill these orders but we try our best to make it happen.
Slight imperfections and small variations on the fabrics may exist as is common in natural fibres, and we strive to minimize variations while the production is done on the hand loom weaving machines. After fabrics are woven, they are then processed further in our finished-product department.
We inherited the structures that we are in so we need to plan, grow and build even bigger more flexible structures of our own. The goal is also to stop renting. Prime land comes with a number of issues so we need to live free of that.
She however believes that as long as they keep producing quality products, beat deadlines, understand customer requests and needs, and communicate well, most of these problems can be dealt with.
Advice
You need to have a skill. People who have skills can somehow fend for themselves. For example, during the COVID Lockdown, most of them were able to do production in their houses and survived on those hands on skills.
TEXDA prides in being a center of excellence in Uganda where women and men develop their creative skills in textile design and garment production.
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