Sammy Bakari mailed me recently with new photographs of the products being made at the Friends of Kingangop Plateau-managed Njabini Woolshop. Njabini is, as regular readers may know, a community-based weaving and dyeing woolshop which employs and trains local people and uses locally sourced wool thereby providing local farmers an incentive to keep sheep rather than convert Kinangop’s threatened and bio-diverse tussock grasslands - home to the Endangered Sharpe’s Longclaw - into cropland.

The improvement in the quality of the wool and the ‘finish’ of the products is very noticeable, and much of this progress is due, as Sammy explains, to input from Janice G Knausenberger, a biologist and professional weaver living in Kenya.

Janice has brought a wealth of knowledge and expertise to Njabini (and great personal enthusiasm), showing Sammy and the rest of the workforce new techniques for producing softer wool which is more uniformly dyed, and how to turn the weaving ends to create a neat edge for wall hangings. Importantly Janice also introduced a new wool washing technique which uses uses less water and much much less soap than the existing method - and given the drought ravaging Kenya at the moment this could turn out to crucial. Higher quality products will of course make access to local and overseas markets much more likely: this would mean more income for the woolshop and for local farmers, which in turn will have a positive impact on the long-term future of the beautiful and endemic Sharpe’s Longclaw.

On behalf of all the individuals working to make the Njabini Woolshop more efficient, more productive, and better-known for quality product can I take this opportunity to thank Janice for her invaluable work. If you’d like to see a gallery of her remarkably novel and interesting work please go to JKG Designs: Albums.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

10,000 Birds has been working as a project partner with the Friends of Kinangop Plateau, Luca Borghesio, and the National Museums of Kenya since June 2008.

For much more about the Njabini Woolshop and its part in the ongoing work to protect Kenya’s Kinangop Grasslands and the Endangered Sharpe’s Longclaw, please visit our ‘gateway’ page at 10,000 Birds, Friends of Kinangop Plateau, Sharpe’s Longclaw, and the Kinangop Grasslands which contains summaries of aspects of the work all of which link to longer posts and galleries.

If you would like to offer support, help, or advice please do get in touch - contributions are welcomed by all of us working in this exciting and evolving project. We are making a genuine difference to the community on Kinangop, and without community support the future for the Sharpe’s Longclaw will be very bleak indeed.