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COMAMNUVI
COOPERATIVA MAQUILADORA MUJERES DE
NUEVA VIDA INTERNATIONALWomen's Sewing Cooperative, Nueva Vida, Nicaragua
Our Project
In 1998, several countries in Central America, including Nicaragua, were besieged by a terrible hurricane that destroyed the region. After Hurricane Mitch, the Center for Development in Central America (CDCA) began to search for a way to combat the 80% unemployment in Nueva Vida.
Through a marketing partnership with Maggie’s Organics in Michigan, USA, (www.maggiesorganics.com) the idea came about to form a sewing cooperative for the women of Nueva Vida.
In Nicaragua there are many free trade zones where mainly women work in “sweat shops,” producing clothing under unacceptable labor conditions, long hours and low pay.
In a cooperative, the workers are the owners. We are working together to create sustainable employment in the community so that we can support ourselves and our families.
Ourselves
In general, the women who now form part of the Women’s Sewing Cooperative of Nueva Vida were unemployed before coming to work with the cooperative. Before being moved out to Nueva Vida after Hurricane Mitch, we lived on the shores of Lake Managua where some of us fished for a living.
Others, like our president Zulema Mena, worked selling vegetables in the streets of Mercado Oriental, the main market in Managua. As members, we have had to make many sacrifices for the cooperative – for two years we worked without earning a salary.
We built the building with our own hands and we each had to work a total of 640 hours to become members of the cooperative. For the members of the Women’s Sewing Co-op, our dream for the future is to raise our production levels in order to provide steady full-time employment for more families in our community.
In 2002 we gave employment to 123 heads of household. One of our goals is to generate more earnings in order to be able to put a percentage of our profits toward social projects
Our Labor Practice
Our co-op has a policy of not allowing anyone to work more than a total of three months without applying for membership in the cooperative. We implemented this policy in order to avoid a worker vs. owner dynamic: we are all worker-owners and we all have a vested interest in the health and success of our business. Our worker-owners are treated fairly.
We are free to leave our work stations as needed, and we work an eight-hour shift unless we – collectively as a cooperative – decide to work extra hours. We struggle to pay ourselves good wages without endangering the success of the cooperative as a whole.
Our average worker earns 40% more than the average Free Trade Zone worker in Nicaragua and all of our members share in the profits of our cooperative.
As a maquila, we specialize in producing high quality t-shirts of organic or conventional cotton cloth for export. We are the only worker-owned cooperative in the world currently producing “clean” tees.
We make t-shirts, camisoles, nightshirts, shorts and more. We are a fully equipped sew shop and guarantee that all of our products are ethically made by the worker-owners in our cooperative.
Our Sweat, Our Sale, Our Success!
We need you! You can help the women's sewing cooperative through buying our products, buying Maggie's products, and by putting us in touch with potential buyers.
Km. 11 Carretera Nueva a León, 1.6 Km. Abajo,
Contiguo Rancho Masilí
Managua, NICARAGUA
Telephone/fax: 011-505-269-7073/011-505-883-6634
Website: www.fairtradezone.jhc-cdca.org
Email: jhc@jhc-cdca.org
Link to our other partner Maquiladora of Dignity and Justice
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