A ‘paper seed village’, aimed at training women and youth in the making of eco-friendly toys, to eventually transforms the lives of poor families, will come up in Pakshikere, located about 22 km away from Mangaluru city.
“We have been working with NITK, Surathkal, in developing a design for toys with a special focus on flora and fauna of Dakshina Kannada district," said Nitin Vas of Paper Seed Company, who had launched the initiative with support from the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises and guidance from NITK, Surathkal.
The social entrepreneur said they were making eco-friendly colourful Mangaluru toys using paper mache or paper pulp manually.
"Now, we will start using moulds for mass production of such toys in the paper seed village,” Nitin Vas told DH.
The foundation stone for the paper seed village will be laid on April 23, he added.
“Sustainable eco-friendly construction with mud walls and traditional and sustainable construction that are followed in the region will be taken up. The government has extended support to designing toys depicting the local flora and fauna of the district. About 75% of the cost will be borne by the government and the remaining 25% from our resources, he said.
For infrastructure alone, we will be spending around Rs 15 lakh,” said Vas.
The paper seed village will have a research centre focusing on the development of environment-friendly and biodegradable products, a toy production centre and a skill development centre for training rural women and youth. We will conduct training workshops for local youth every month, he said.
"We will also train women to work from home so that they can earn income while staying at home. Eventually, the entire village will be involved in making toys on the lines of Channapatna toys,” he added.
Paper seed village, tapping solar energy, will be a unique village. Tourists will get an opportunity to interact with artisans and how eco-friendly products are conceptualised.
The village when completed will have toys, eco-friendly jewellery, cups, paper straws, bamboo toothbrushes, earrings, baskets, seed pens, seasonal products like Christmas decorative items such as stars, large balls, Santa Claus, national flags and badges (biodegradable) for Independence Day and rakhis with variety of seeds for Raksha Bandhan.