Grow Your Own Cure.Guatemalan Weavers of Ancestral Designs Argue For Protection. A case, led by a group of women from the community of San Juan Sacatepequez supported by an association of Mayan lawyers asked the courts to have Congress introduce laws specifically aimed at protecting Mayan cultural intellectual property.
Why is this related to Travel and Tourism in Guatemala?
Million visit Guatemala each year for Business, Pleasure and the History and the Culture of Guatemala. Antigua is the anchor Historical landmark in Guatemala, Tikal for the Ruins, Lake Atitlan for the Lake. Rio Dulce has the River, Monterrico has the Coast line. Guatemala is a complete cultural destination.
Guatemalan Weavers of Ancestral Designs Argue For Protection
Why, walk through Antigua, Panajachel or Chichicastenango Market, you see Woven products on every turn. Visit any village and you will see Weavers sitting and Back Strap weaving. How does one tell if it is real or Machine made? You need to ask. Today, the only way to be sure is go directly to a Village. Search on-line for Co-Ops, most of the Guatemalan Co-Ops for Weavers all use Facebook.
On-line you see Guatemala Weavers Products proudly displayed on the websites selling these products. Then there is the prices, I see a nice bag on one of these websites featuring pictures of the Weavers of a village with a price tag of $250.00 US. I see the similar bag in a village market for $250Q.
Who is making all the profits? Not the Weavers. Another reason the designs need to be protected.
Guatemalan Weavers
We also see NGO’s operating claiming to support the Weavers of a specific village. The NGO has a nice website showing the weavers products. High prices. Are the weavers improving there quality of life. No, I see the same situation in these villages year after year.
In the hearing, representative Angelina Aspuac argued that the Guatemalan government uses Mayan culture as a selling point for tourism without taking steps to protect the communities’ collective rights over what she describes as a kind of living culture. She also argued that there is a question of labor rights at stake since it is Indigenous women who weave the iconic textiles while others reap the majority of the economic benefits.
The Chinese came to Guatemala and attempted to recreate these traditional designs by machine could not be done.
Guatemalan textiles, straight from the weaver’s hands
Each Village in Guatemala that continues to follow the Indigenous culture of Weaving have their own distinct designs which represents that villages history. It is in the clothing the women of that village, in the colours and design which reflects the cultural history of that village.
“What we want is a law to protect our textiles because it is something that is ours, we learned from our grandparents how to weave,” said Kaqchikel weaver Marta Puac, one of dozens of women from different communities who went to the Constitutional Court in Guatemala City on Tuesday in support of the initiative.
What do you think?
Guatemalan Weavers of Ancestral Designs Argue For Protection
Grow your own cure 
Grow Your Own Cure 
Grow Your Own Cure