1. Who are they?
Most of them are Indians and Chinese minorities in the urban area who form the urban poor. They were/are low-income or unemployed under these categories: single moms, women with disabilities, patients with chronic illnesses, women taking care of disabled family members or elderly family members.
There are about 300 in the database at a time, eH can only afford to help this number due to limited resources. After training most of them are kept in the database for job matching with employers or refer to other NGOs for special assistance or being adopted by mentors to groom their homebased businesses.
Those who have been with the project for more than two years have seen their financial situation greatly improved. They can speak basic English, deal with the public more confidently and also travel on their own. Some also become voters as they are more conscious of their rights in all aspects.
2. Their houses have TVs, washing machines, computers, and nice furniture.
The SW project was started since 2004. eH raises funds, donation of things through its e-community and affiliates. Over the years, the most hardcore poor have gotten furniture, kitchen utensils and old electronic equipment E.g., in 2009, the Swiss Embassy donated its teak wood furniture and leather couch to eH which in turn gave them to a sex worker whose house had little furniture. Many women who attended computer classes were also given old computers. Most of these computers do not work well after one year but the women keep them in the houses to look good.
Almost all of the Salaam women have received donated handphone, some can even take photos.In 2011, a spectacle manufacturer donated glass frames to eH which in turn gave Salaam women and families these glass frames, some of the frames could cost up to Rm800 in shops.
3. They have cars!!
Public transport is quite inadequate here. It is one of our biggest problems to help the urban poor especially those involve in good based products. It is costly to pay taxi drivers to deliver their products and take hours to deliver goods if they take buses and trains. All of them are homemakers, who are often patients who are not supposed to be exposed to sunlight/stress, they can’t afford the time and the energy to do the delivery.
The best weavers in the ecobasket project, for eg, have been trained to save money and drive small cars like the locally made Kancil, which cost a buyer Rm50/m to pay by hire purchase. eH encourages them to save money and buy a car, old or small, to help them to do homebased businesses as delivery is the biggest problem for finished products.
4. They wear jewellery
It is cultural for the Malays and Indian women to wear abundance of glittering, gold-looking jewelleries when visitors come to their houses. If they know foreigners are coming, they would borrow any gold-looking jewelleries from their relatives or neighbors for the occasion. Also, fake gold jewelleries are common among the urban poor.
5. Poverty line in Malaysia for household of 4 : earn less than Rm2000/m
According to the government, number of hard core poor has been greatly reduced. But there are still people who are really struggling to live especially in the urban areas. Most of them are women with young children and elderly.
If a Salaam women drives a Kancil, the locally made car (she needs to pay Rm50/m to buy a Kancil car to deliver goods, it is cheaper than taking taxis), she may only earns Rm800 from the ecobaskets per month, she is still struggling financially.
6. Farmer beneficiaries rich, e.g. Tambun farmers, one of them have 2 cars.
Farmers need cars to carry produce; we don’t have bullock carts any more, no donkeys or mules in Malaysia. Please note the herbal doctor in the Tambun project is not a farmer, he was put inside the Tambun farm package to help move Tambun eco-tourism, his 3 grown children work in Ipoh and KL, they often go back to visit him. He and his wife have a car, also to transport outside visitors to learn from him. The rest of the farmers have old cars as they need the vehicles to transport their produce.
