BENGALURU: Amid the demand for indigenous, environment friendly, sustainable, GI tagged, heritage handmade products globally, the National Livelihood Mission (NLM) in Karnataka has expanded marketing opportunities for women's Self-Help Group (SHG) products by providing an online platform to them by tying up with Amazon and Flipkart.
The NLM has already provided a platform for 70 SHG products on Amazon and 50 SHG products on Flipkart and is helping SHGs reach out to domestic buyers nationwide through this, according to its mission director in Karnataka, Manjushree N.
She said the NLM has signed an MOU with a startup ‘Kulturestreet’, which is providing a platform for international marketing for 15 SHG products from the state.
Manjushree N also said that, through the “Lokos” app, they are connecting all 50,000 SHGs in Karnataka and digitising their entire transaction, right from Zilla Panchayat to federation of SHGs to SHG members, to monitor money flow.
Also, for the first time after the pandemic began, the NLM which comes under the state’s department of ‘Skill Development, Entrepreneurship and Livelihood for Economic Empowerment of Women’ is providing a huge marketing platform to over 700 women entrepreneurs of 310 SHGs from across the country (including 150 from the state), who were hit by the pandemic, by hosting a ten-day national level exhibition ‘Sanjeevini Saras Mela 2022’, at National College grounds in Bengaluru, which began on Friday.
The women entrepreneurs are showcasing their skills, exhibiting and selling handmade products in 310 stalls. The mela is providing a platform to expand their markets, as they are having CSR round table discussions with corporates, buyer meets, startup and NGO conclaves to reach out to new buyers. The mela is also providing opportunities to women participants to improve their skills by having workshops by women entrepreneurs. NLM plans to host more such expos at all districts and taluks across the state, every month, to provide a platform to market women SHG products and strengthen and promote women SHGs.