Livelihood Assitance in Sri Lanka

A workshop on Marketing in Kilinochchi district, Northern part of Sri Lanka

 On December 8th last year, JEN held a workshop on marketing for 32 people who participated JEN’s project.

 In this workshop, we focused on the importance and necessity of marketing for local residents to sell their harvest effectively. The participants showed a great interest and worked on the project enthusiastically.

 To encourage the understanding and cooperation among the participants, we worked on the agenda below in the workshop:

- What is marketing?

- Where and what we sell?

- Marketing strategy

 Also, we discussed a new method and a strategy of marketing such as what kind of crops we will produce during the rainy season. Through this workshop, the participants were able to obtain important skills to plan ahead for the future. For example, they learned when to produce what kind of crops in accordance with each season.

 These marketing strategies should enable the locals to manage their businesses more effectively, which help them to increase their profit and income.

In the group discussion, we discussed the items below:

  How to ensure customers and consumers both in local and urban areas.

  How to decide the prices at the market.

  How to grow better quality crops.

  How to sell their products and what issues to solve.

 At the workshop, to take proactive steps for the rain season, we explained that dried food or powdered products are in on demand.  The lecture about crops and products that can be adopted for changing weather was popular among the participants. It seemed that the marketing lecture featuring seasonal issues was helpful for the participants.

 At the end of the workshop, the lecturer explained about the flour mill and the dried food factory that JEN has built, and it is possible to make their solid financial stability which would be effective growth and selling crops.

We hope that these efforts could empower and sustain the growth of the community.