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By PETER BATE
One could argue that Daniel Salcedo was destined to have one foot in Latin America and the other one in the United
States.
PEOPLink founder Salcedo and Martínez Kantule discuss on-line product descriptions.
(Photo: Arlette Pedraglio - IDB)
The Texas-born son of a Colombian father and an American mother, Salcedo was raised in Bogotá and went to college in
his native state. After obtaining a Ph.D. in operations research, he worked in anti-poverty projects for such agencies as the U.S.
Peace Corps, USAID, the OAS, PAHO and the UNDP in several Latin American countries.
Today, Salcedo heads an organization that is helping indigenous artisans in Latin America and elsewhere enter the era of
electronic commerce. Called PEOPLink, this nonprofit organization is helping microentre-preneurs who may not even have
access to telephones and electricity to stake out their own "space" on the Internet.
Salcedo and a representative of the Kuna people from Panama were at the IDB recently to showcase PEOPLink and to explain
how the project will expand with help from the Bank-administered Multilateral Investment Fund. Under the plan, MIF will
channel the funds to PEOPLink through the Trust for the Americas, a foundation chartered under the Organization of American
States.
Beyond catalogue sales . Salcedo and his Colombian-born wife Marijke Velzeboer established PEOPLink in 1995 to take their
previous experience in marketing handicrafts through catalogue sales to a higher level.
The Salcedos had learned early on that it takes more than good intentions to capture consumers’ imaginations. In their very first
business deal they ended up with 200 dozen woven palm leaf hats which they had bought from artisans in a Guatemalan
mountain village.
Intricately embroidered molas command good prices in the folk art market (Photo: Arlette Pedraglio - IDB)
The hats did not start to sell until the day Salcedo happened to adorn his stand at an arts and craft fair with
pictures of the weavers at work. When people stopped to look at the photographs, he engaged them with stories about how the
hats were made and how the villagers lived, the problems of poverty and the opportunities offered by fair trade.
In that spirit, PEOPLink’s website offers not only products, but glimpses into the lives of the people who make them. Salcedo
started by buying products in bulk, typically from artisan cooperatives, in order to keep a stock in the United States and thus be
able to fill orders quickly. He then took digital pictures of the products and displayed them on his website, along with as much
information as he could gather about their origin and their makers. Later, Salcedo began giving simple digital cameras to the
cooperatives so they could snap pictures of their wares and send them via e-mail to PEOPLink’s office in Kensington,
Maryland, in the United States. In the many cases where the artisans have no telephones or computers, PEOPLink struck
"trading partner relationships" with like-minded NGOs to provide the service.
With the help of grants and donations, Salcedo has built up a network that already serves some 100,000 artisans and small
business owners in 20 countries.
One of the groups that is already using PEOPLink’s services is Cooperativa de Productoras de Molas, which includes 1,500
Kuna Indian women in the San Blas islands, off Panama’s Caribbean coast. The women sew molas, intricately designed and
colorful embroideries that have been used to decorate Kuna dresses for generations. Rosita Martínez Kantule, the
cooperative’s marketing manager, said that the Internet offers the Kuna artisans a chance to bypass the middlemen who usually
demand huge discounts to buy their handicrafts in bulk. "We are always looking for ways to cut our costs and improve our
margins," Martínez Kantule said. "Travel is very expensive for us, and the Internet offers us a way to keep
down our marketing costs."
While PEOPLink has demonstrated that its model works, Salcedo would like to take the idea to the next level: empowering the
artisans themselves with the technology needed to succeed in international electronic commerce. "It is vital for indigenous
groups and artisans to stake their ground before it is all taken up by others," he said.
Multilateral Investment Fund General Manager Donald F. Terry predicts that an expanded PEOPLink program will bring a
number of benefits, including encouraging entrepreneurship among indigenous groups and women, providing artisans with
access to international markets and bridging a gaping technological divide.
"Countries are moving into the new economy at very different speeds and in very disparate conditions," he said.
"By using Internet technology, this project helps to network indigenous populations and microen-trepreneurs, putting them
in closer contact with other people and with markets around the world."
For additional information see
www.peoplink.org/kuna
or
www.trustforthe americas.org.
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