The Taita-Taveta County covers an area of 17,083 square kilometers, 62% of which falls within national parks. The remaining 5,879 square kilometers is occupied by ranches, sisal estates, bodies of water, and hilltop forests. Weaving baskets is a tradition in Taita culture. The sisal baskets produced in Kenya's Taita Taveta County are regarded by many as regional treasures. The unique baskets are produced according to the traditional art, most often by local women who have passed down the skill from generation to generation. This precious craft used to be given as traditional wedding gifts by mothers to their daughters.
“Taita Baskets” are sisal baskets handwoven by women in Taita Taveta County. The women were weaving their baskets in small groups scattered throughout the county and many of these separate groups were creating and promoting their products in different or even counterproductive ways. Most of them are middle-aged or elderly, laboriously crafted in a traditional way from the thin sisal fibers, and used for household purposes such as carrying things and storing grains.
The baskets come in a number of different colours and patterns, with each design entirely made up by these artistic Taita ladies. They use hard fibres from the sisal plant – a succulent that grows well in hot and dry areas – which are then hand-twisted and dyed to craft the baskets. Sisal is an exceptionally durable and strong material, and it is resilient even to salt water. The result is a remarkably soft feel thanks to the tightly woven fine mesh, as well as a natural resistance to color fading. The baskets can have both practical and decorative applications. Making baskets is a very labour intensive art.
Though in Kenya traditionally Sansevieria and baobab fibres have been used for basket weaving, now the ladies rely on sisal because of its suitability and vast availability. They dye the fibres themselves and then roll the twine on their lap. The sisal fibres are coloured by adding them to the desired dye and bringing them up to the boil. They are then left out in the shade to dry. Traditionally ladies have used natural colorants like certain tree bark or soil to create earthen shades of black, brown, grey and pale pinks and yellows. Textile dyes are now broadly being used in order to obtain bright colours. Using sisal fibres, the ladies have to roll it to produce twine. This requires amazing skill since it necessitates the women to roll, upon their bare legs, consistent amounts of sisal fibres into each other to obtain a good quality twine that has the same thickness all over. This is probably the most time consuming element of the entire basket making process. Finally only once the lady has enough twine in the colour she wants, can begin weaving her basket. The weaving starts at the centre of the bottom of the basket.
Basket weaving empowers these women through their work that is flexible, creative and fairly paid. The sale of the baskets brings them an important cash income, which allows them to pay school fees for their children and put more food on the table. However, some may have suspected that they had a product with great business potential, but exploiting that opportunity seemed complex and out of reach. It is difficult for an individual basket weaver to find new customers on her own. They weave so many baskets but they lack customers to sell them to. Women are constrained from going long distances to promote their products, as they often bear the responsibility of housework and childcare in addition to agricultural work. Therefore, the main buyers of their baskets are brokers, who come and collect the baskets as well as tourists staying at lodges in the area.
Opportunely, the basket weavers now have succeeded in obtaining a valuable IP tool for branding – the first step in an exciting journey to build the “Taita Basket” brand. They are united in their aim to develop a strong, recognizable and profitable regional brand by using the mark. This will help the predominantly female community of basket weavers become more competitive in the market. By collaborating to procure raw materials in bulk, they are now able to reduce the cost and enjoy the benefits of economies of scale. Thanks to the collective mark, their baskets will be easy to distinguish from similar products and the quality standards associated with the mark will help increase faith in the products, as well as drive sales and expansion.
