Greenstar is proud to be an Affinity Partner of PEOPLink, an organization with goals that are parallel to ours; read the whole story below. If you're not yet familiar with Greenstar, read an introduction here.

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There are many beautiful, unique gift ideas in the PEOPLink catalog, each with a story behind it.

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The Concept

The Internet can allow people to buy goods and services from merchants anywhere in the world. This resolves the issues of channels (how remote merchants sell their goods to the buyer) and distribution (getting the goods to the buyer from remote destinations). It is simply a matter of the merchant setting up a web site for sales.

But what about third world countries where phone lines and even electricity can't be taken for granted? PEOPLink is a non-profit that helps artisans in remote communities around the world to sell their products over the Internet.

PEOPLink was founded by Daniel Salcedo and Marijke Velzeboer to facilitate ecommerce directly with producers in the developing world, eliminating the middleman and ensuring maximal profitability for the producer.

This technique is more effective than traditional economic aid or charity because it allows people to build their own sustainable future, based on what they do best, and improve their quality of life using their traditional skills.

Roots

PEOPLink's roots go back to 1979, with an organization called Pueblo to People. Dan Salcedo and Marijke Velzeboer were a young couple living in Guatemala in the late '70s. Dan worked for the UN and Marijke was finishing a Ph.D. in public health. One day at a party, Marijke had a conversation with the U.S. Peace Corps country director, who asked her to do an evaluation of a Peace Corps program in the highlands of Guatemala.

While there, Marijke and Dan were impressed by well-made, sturdy palm leaf hats made by the local people. They had been thinking about trying to sell some of the crafts they had seen in Guatemala to people back in the USA and these hats seemed like an ideal starting point.

Quickly, Dan realized that they needed to not sell not just the products themselves, but their context within the lives of the artisans that created them. Pueblo to People marketed crafts from artisans in Latin American to people in the USA through a mail order catalog. The organization had a very successful model of self-sustaining development that empowered the poor. Its annual sales grew to $3.5M, supporting 3,000 families in more than a dozen countries.

Methods

PEOPLink maintains a web site that lists the artisans' products for sale. PEOPLink buys products in bulk, so they can be shipped to customers quickly. This advance purchase allows the producer to buy raw materials and supplies for creating more items, more cost-effectively. PEOPLink takes a percentage of the sale, but the majority of the profit is passed along to the artisan.

PEOPLink develops a "trading partner relationship" with local non-profit development organizations that have relationships with local grassroots groups such as craft cooperatives, widows groups, refugee associations and peasant leagues.

Each trading partner provides services to several of these grassroots groups, taking pictures of the artisans at work and the products for sale. They can also answer questions about products via email. Trading partners make the link between the artisan and technology.

PEOPLink supports trading partners via training -- both in person and on-line -- and email. PEOPLink equips the trading partners with digital cameras and trains them on how to use the cameras and a computer to edit the captured images and edit them in a compressed format suitable for transmission via the Internet.

Examples

Perhaps the best way to understand just what PEOPLink is doing and the diversity of products being sold is to look at a few examples.

Guatemala: Custom Wholesale

Maximo Terraza is a very bright young Guatemalan, but his parents were unable to afford to send him to college. His work with PEOPLink has given him invaluable training. Maximo supports 8-9 weaving groups, travelling throughout his local area taking pictures of people doing the weaving and dyeing. He has created an extensive web site in Spanish for the groups he supports, completely on his own.

Recently, Maximo engineered one of the largest PEOPLink sales to date. A wholesale customer was looking for green baskets at PEOPLink. He found a basket on the wholesale site that was close, but it was too big and too expensive, so an email message was sent to Maximo, to determine if it was possible to get the basket made in a smaller size and a lower price.

Maximo worked directly with the producer, took a picture of a new sample to the customer's specifications and sent back an email message with the picture and a lower price. The customer was delighted and placed an order for $13,000 in baskets. "The trading partner handled this completely on his own. The first we heard about it was when he asked us to help him with translation of the email messages," Dan Salcedo, the CEO of PEOPLink explained proudly.

Uganda: Sapphire Women and the AIDS Victim fund

Helen Mutono's brother died of AIDS, and she was concerned for his widow and children. How would they survive? Unfortunately, Helen's situation is not uncommon. By the year 2000 it is estimated that there will be close to 1 million children orphaned in Uganda.

From this personal tragedy Helen formed two organizations: Sapphire Women and the AIDS Victim Fund.

Sapphire Women produce baskets that are then donated to Helen and sold via the PEOPLink web site. There are currently about 500 women involved in production of these baskets.

The women work out of their home and vary from young, unmarried teenagers to grandmothers who would like to see something done for the orphans in their village. The revenues from the sales fund the AIDS Victim Fund.

Nepal: Janakpur Women's Development Center

In 1989, Janakpur Women's Development Center became the first non-governmental organization in Nepal to use the tradition of painting for the empowerment and advancement of Maithil women.

Traditionally, these women paint intricate designs on the mud walls of their homes for special occasions, like marriage or festivals. Typical subject matter includes animals such as peacocks, elephants and tigers, the gods and scenes from traditional folk tales. The center helped to train the women to move from the traditional mud wall as their canvas, to Iokta -- a Nepali handmade paper. The women use acrylic paint applied with brushes to create their artwork.

Prior to the center's opening, few opportunities existed for Maithil women earn cash and to engage in the skills of leadership, literacy or even basic business.

PEOPLink works with almost 100 organizations in 30 countries: Bolivia, Chile, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Mexico, Panama, Peru, Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Tibet, Viet Nam, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Morocco, Rwanda, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda.