Wooden Handicrafts Cluster

The Challenge

Jodhpur’s wood and wrought-iron artisans — many of them migrant-origin craftsmen — had the carving and joinery skills to make quality furniture and décor, but little access to the design updates, raw materials, or buyer networks that would let that skill translate into a sustainable livelihood.

Our Response

UJAS organised artisans into 15 self-help groups across seven areas of the city — 225 artisans in total — under a scheme backed by Udhyam Protsahan Sansthan and the District Industries Centre, part of the Industries Department, Government of Rajasthan. Over the project period, 135 artisans went through soft-skill and design-development training, including sessions run at the Industrial Training Institute, Jodhpur, and the cluster produced a video documentary and a 500-copy product catalogue to support marketing.

The project also set up a dedicated web portal (jodhpurcraftscluster.com) so artisans’ work could be found online outside the fair circuit.

Reaching the Market

The cluster carried its furniture, décor, and textile pieces to major trade fairs and exhibitions — the @Home World Expo at Bombay Exhibition Centre, Mumbai (November 2019), the FORHEX Fair at Birla Auditorium, Jaipur (August 2019), IHGF Delhi Fair events, and B2B meets connecting artisans directly with domestic and international buyers, including delegations from China. Local press covered the cluster’s design training programmes, run in partnership with the Export Promotion Council for Handicrafts (EPCH).