Serving schools with sewing skills
As part of the Gauteng Department of Social Development's project to help establish small local businesses, five women in Kagiso came together to sew and help their community.
or many in our community, life is all about helping others. To be able to do just that, organisations must also be in a stable enough financial position to sustain themselves.
With this in mind, the Gauteng Department of Social Development launched a project years back to help entrepreneurs in rural areas start their own self-sustainable businesses with the aim of also helping their communities.
Modipakoma Sewing and Multi-Purpose Primary Cooperative is one such enterprise located in Kagiso Extension 12.
Five women came together in 2016 to combine their needlecraft skills to produce school clothes for the department’s School Uniform Manufacturing Project.
One of the Modipakoma managing members Selinah Khava said, “Following the establishment of our cooperative, we started manufacturing traditional clothes for people around our community. In the meanwhile, we gathered information on the process to become part of the departmental project. We complied with all the processes and met the requirements. We grabbed the opportunity and got the funding”.
Co-managing member Tebora Panama added, “It was not easy when we started five years ago as we did not have knowledge of running a business. Due to the guidance and support we got from the department, we were able to expand and create more jobs”.
The team, which is mainly comprised of Selinah, Tebora, Pinky Mofeti, Jeannette Makhubela and Dikeledi Makhubela now produce school uniforms, personal protective equipment and church uniforms.
Tebora went on to say, “We always rope in community members through offering them skills such as sewing. We welcome everyone who is determined although the Covid-19 pandemic is limiting our abilities. We wish to get a bigger space and more machinery for expansion and continue to create more jobs. We want to empower others as we were also empowered by Social Development. We will forever be grateful to the department for the opportunity they afforded us with and we will show our gratitude by empowering others”.
