St. Martin CSA has several income generating activities to become a more sustainable and self-reliant organization. One of these activities is the Marleen Project, which involves a leather workshop, woodcarving workshop and Curioshop. In the 2 workshops beneficiaries of St. Martin selected from the 5 different community programmes are trained to become independent professional artists. Through this activity they have an opportunity to create a better future for themselves and their families. The items sold form a financial basis which supports the organization’s activities.

The History

In 2002 when the very first group of beneficiaries was trained to become professional leatherwork artists, a young Dutch volunteer Marleen Bannink joined St. Martin CSA.  She was attached to the Community Programme for Street and Needy Children, where she was very popular due to her humility and love for the Children. To everyone's immense grief she was tragically killed in a car accident on the 28th of May 2002. To honor her presents in our midst, this newly started income generating activity was named after her as ‘the Marleen Project’. After the initial stage also a woodcarving workshop was started for beneficiaries with a different talent. A Curioshop was opened to  promote and sell their items. Currently the former beneficiaries of St. Martin are strong and independent artists providing for themselves and their loved ones. Their items are sold not only to local visitors but even exported to Europe.

The Leather and Woodcarving workshop