Centro de Bordados Cuenca is a craft co-operative conceived in the city of Cuenca, in 1989. Since 1989 we, a strong women group, offer exclusive arts from our rural communities located in the Southern region of Ecuador. We’ve met the demand of offering products made by hand and of natural fibers. The majority of our products is done upon request, which means uniqueness and exclusivity along with highest quality.
About Us
Who we are
Mission
The Cooperativa de Produccion Artesanal Centro de Bordados Cuenca is a legal organization of popular economics and solidarity, made of artistic women, whose principal values are of respect and unity. It is an organization formed with the economic belief that development will be equitable for all partners. It is a belief that a number of able women can compete on a national and international level to offer a wide variety of artistic products of the highest quality. It is a candle for the good we offer and a setting to dispose social services.
Vision
The Cooperativa de Produccion Artesanal Centro de Bordados Cuenca looks to the year 2022. We aspire to consolidate the principals of unity, continued training and a quality embracing humanity. To satisfy the needs of our economic partners offering fair compensation and stable work, we will deliver to the national and international markets work of the highest quality. We will contribute through our artistic endeavors ecologic equilibrium. We will support our partners that actively participate in this direction and administration of the Cooperative.
History
- Centro De Bordados Cuenca exists to protect the Art of Hand Embroidery. The Swiss Agency for Development (COSUDE) and the Ecuadorian Fund for Development of the People (FEPP) made this possible in 1989. The objectives are to:
- Promote the organization of women
- Fight against the control by the “middle-man”
- Give organizational and technical knowledge to women
- Raise the level of income
- These agencies funded the program with technical and financial support from 1989-1994 . They felt this was a sufficient period of time for the women to become autonomous and self-sufficient. The project terminated in June of 1997.
- 1994-1997 set a stage for transition, whereby the member communities would have the influence in the decisions of the cooperative.
- May 3, 1993 the cooperative is legally recognized with 132 women as founders. They came from 11 rural area around the cities of Cuenca, Paute and Gualaceo.
- The most pressing problems facing the women were: alcoholism, physical abuse of the women and children, low self-esteem, exclusion, movement from local areas to Guayaquil and Morona Santiago and the immigration to the United States and Spain.
Values
- Organized Commitment and Leadership
- Honesty in our daily actions
- A joint responsibility with the mechanism of reciprocity
- Unity and a concern for our community, with mutual cooperation among our partners
- Products of the highest quality
- Fair prices
- Responsibility to the environment
- Respect and self-esteem among the partnerships
- Ethics, transparency and profit for our accounts
- Constant training and seminars from the partners
- Permanent self-management
Team
