Sustainable Eco-Textile Production in Indonesia: The Role of Sunda Wiwitan Women
| Date | Wednesday, 28 August 2024 | Time | 12:30 – 1:30pm |
| Venue | Sidney Myer Asia Centre, Room 321 | Location | The University of Melbourne |
Sunda Wiwitan is a local belief system (Indonesian: aliran kepercayaan) in Sundanese-speaking areas of West Java, Indonesia.
The documentary Finding the Book of Life in the Land of AKUR: Protecting Nature and Cultural Heritage by Positioning Women in Sustainable Business (2023) describes the journey of the Sunda Wiwitan women as economic actors, how they gain entrepreneurship skills and understand women’s access to and control over sustainable natural resources.
Documentary producer Zubaidah Djohar provided deeper insight into how women’s social and cultural practices through creating a batik eco-textile business can support sustainability and fight against marginalisation, both for the women themselves and more broadly for their environment.
Speaker profile
Over the past 20 years, Zubaidah Djohar has been concerned with Women, Peace, and Security (WPS), local potential, and sustainability.
Her brand, Jalinka, supported the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) to develop a Garut Indigenous collective mark. Her writings and initiatives have actively promoted peace and justice for Aceh women and youth.
She has also simultaneously supported her clients – ADB, USAID, AusAID, IFC, MCC, WB, and Islamic Relief – in Indonesian actions. These programs involved all stakeholders and focused on peace-building, sustainable infrastructure investment, economic growth, emergency assistance, productivity partnerships, business sustainability, green prosperity, and energy.
She also fosters culture, humanism, and literature. Throughout the pandemic, as the founder of Empu Jalin Karsa (EJK), she collaborated with communities, agencies, activists, artists, entrepreneurs, and economic actors to produce thousands of free medical masks for isolated Indonesian community health centres and respond to thousands of citizens. She also created a cathartic dance space.
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