The woman successfully started a business from knitting sedge

One hot day in June, we had another appointment with member Hoang Thi Oanh, center 66, Xuan Phuong commune, Xuan Truong district, Nam Dinh province. When she came to greet us, she smiled and confided many meaningful things.

She has only been with TYM for 2 years, but those 2 years were really a huge turning point for her family and her business project. Starting a business with nothing, in 2018 she single-handedly raised the hope of restoring a profession that was lost 20 years ago in her own homeland – sedge knitting. “Starting a business from sedge with unique and environmentally friendly crafts” is no longer a strange phrase when people came to Xuan Phuong commune and mentioned Mrs. Oanh’s name. Currently, her business model is being widely deployed in the communes of Xuan Phuong, Xuan Phong, Xuan Phu, Tho Nghiep, Xuan Trung, and Giao Tien in Xuan Truong and Giao Thuy districts. There are few projects that create jobs for 200 main workers in households and more than 100 seasonal workers, including TYM members and more than 12 households with weak people such as poor households, near-poor households, households with women who have lost their working capacity.

Her project is providing the market with more than 30 product lines from sedge such as sedge buckets, bags, sedge mats, sedge caps, mirror shelves. Products have stable output in the markets of Japan, Korea, Thailand, and Malaysia. Confiding in us, she happily said: “In 2020, she borrowed the first loan from TYM to expand her business project. In the past, she only had family’s capital and had no experience, did not know how to expand the market and how to complete a business project or expand her project. Until being guided by TYM staff to participate in the Women’s Startup Contest of the Vietnam Women’s Union, she was fortunate to have a project that was evaluated as promising and entered the top 2 qualifiers. It was also after that turning point that she became more mature, she gained more knowledge about starting a business, had more new orders in the U.S. and expanded the domestic market. She was also invited by Nam Dinh Radio and Television Station to participate in a reportage on production and business models. Thanks to that, many women in the area knew and joined Mrs. Oanh’s project. Mrs. Oanh hopes that TYM will always be with her and the members here.”

Mrs. Oanh also shared that she wants to strive in the future to seek and expand more domestic markets, supplying the market with up to 50 product lines from sedge, completing the output stage instead of exporting raw products as it is today. To do that, Mrs. Oanh always hopes that TYM will always support women like her so that they have more capital for a successful start-up.

Looking at the products from Mrs. Oanh’s project, we are very surprised and impressed. From inanimate sedges, the skillful hands of the women here blow souls into extremely sophisticated handmade products. We completely believe in Mrs. Oanh’s energy on her entrepreneurial path.

Saying goodbye to Mrs. Oanh, we continue our journey to visit other members of TYM and secretly promise: Where there are women determined to rise up, we will come and accompany them towards success.

Technical Officer Tong Thi Giang, Transaction Office 02, Nam Truc Branch