The Buhoma Community Craft Cooperative was founded in 2006 by seven women who made traditional woven baskets and had no reliable market for them. In 2027, it has 80 members, a permanent workshop at the Buhoma sector briefing point, an online store, and annual revenue of approximately USD 55,000 from sales to gorilla trekking tourists, lodge gift shops, and export buyers. The cooperative did not grow by accident. It grew because gorilla tourists created a market, because a community development NGO provided initial business training, and because the 80 women inside it built a product quality and organisational structure that sustained growth over two decades. This is their story.
The Beginning: Seven Women and a Market Gap
The seven founding members of the cooperative were experienced basket weavers — a traditional craft in the region — but had no consistent way to sell their work. They sold at local markets when they could, but prices were low, buyers were intermittent, and the time spent at markets often did not cover the income lost from not farming. A community development officer working in Buhoma in 2005 identified this problem and suggested that gorilla trekking tourists might be willing to pay significantly more for high-quality traditional crafts than local market prices reflected.
A pilot market stall was established at the Buhoma briefing point in early 2006. The results were immediate: tourists who had just experienced an emotionally significant gorilla encounter were in a receptive mood for purchasing tangible mementos, and they were willing to pay prices reflecting the craft’s genuine quality rather than distressed local market rates. The first month generated more income than the seven weavers had earned from craft sales in the previous six months combined.
Building the Cooperative Structure
The rapid early success created new challenges. More women wanted to join. Product quality needed to be standardised. Pricing needed to be consistent. Revenue needed to be distributed fairly. A community development NGO provided training in cooperative governance, basic bookkeeping, and quality control systems. By 2009, the cooperative had 25 members, a formal constitution, an elected leadership committee, and a quality grading system for baskets that determined pricing tiers.
The cooperative also began diversifying its product range. Traditional woven baskets remained the core product, but members added bark cloth items (a traditional Ugandan craft experiencing a global design revival), carved wooden bowls and utensils, beaded jewellery using local seed beads, and printed fabric goods using designs developed by the cooperative’s most artistically skilled members. Product diversification reduced dependency on any single product category and gave tourists a wider range of price points to buy at.
The Online Channel: Extending the Market
In 2019, a UK-based fair trade importer approached the cooperative about a wholesale export relationship. This relationship, combined with an online store the cooperative launched in 2021 with support from a digital commerce training programme, has opened markets beyond the tourist groups who visit Buhoma. By 2027, approximately 30 percent of the cooperative’s revenue comes from online sales and export orders, reducing its dependency on in-person tourist traffic — important resilience that the COVID-19 tourism collapse of 2020-2021 demonstrated was necessary.
What the Income Means for Members
Cooperative members earn income from craft sales based on units produced and sold, with a cooperative levy that funds shared expenses (workshop rent, materials, training) and a social fund that provides loans for members facing medical or educational emergencies. Average annual income from cooperative membership for an active weaver in 2027 is approximately UGX 2.5 million (approximately USD 660) — a meaningful supplement to agricultural income and, for some members, the primary household income source.
Beyond income, membership in the cooperative provides access to a savings group, a peer support network, and a professional identity — “cooperative member” — that carries social status in a community where formal employment is relatively rare for women. The cooperative has funded the secondary school fees of 23 members’ children since 2010, from a dedicated education bursary funded by 2 percent of annual sales revenue.
When You Buy at the Buhoma Briefing Point
When you purchase a basket from the cooperative market stall at the Buhoma briefing point in 2027, you are contributing to one of the most successfully sustained community tourism enterprises in western Uganda. The basket you carry home was woven by one of 80 women whose cooperative membership has provided income, skills, social networks, and educational opportunity that would not otherwise have been available to them. The price you pay is fair by any standard — and it is income that stays entirely within the community.
