Volunteer Sack is on a 6 week trip through 3 Lao provinces to identify villages where the skill to make Earth’s Greenest Bag™ still exists.
“I am trying to anticipate the need for increased bag production as global demand grows,” said Sack from Houay Xay, on the Lao/Thailand border. “My journey will take me into remote areas ordinarily accessible only to Khmu people,” he said.
Already there was enormous pay-off during the first week when Sack located people who had worked with Khmu villages on producing handicrafts nearly 15 years ago. They were able to provide much information about distant villages so that he could plan his itinerary.
“The timing of my trip is critical because many villages already use scraps of chemical-based fabric from Chinese shipping sacks to make their bags, which is much faster and easier,” Sack said. “Of course the artificial bags do not last as long, do not stretch and do not grasp their cargo like a Nature Bag.”
Other villages make bags similar to Earth’s Greenest Bag™ using nylon cord from China. Although durable, such bags are far from being “green” because of their fossil fuel content and the disposal problems they present to the environment.
Among the goals of the Nature Bag Khmu/Lao Poverty Reduction Project is the preservation of the art of crafting Earth’s Greenest Bag™ which has existed for thousands of years.
Anousith Phonethasith
Volunteer
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