Lok Virsa, on the pattern of Unesco, is initiating a "Seal of Excellence Award for Handicrafts Products" aiming to encourage handicraft sector, which plays a significant role in local economic development and poverty eradication.
Executive Director, National Institute of Folk and Traditional Heritage, Lok Virsa, Mazharul Islam talking to APP said, the Seal programme aims to enable handicraft producers to establish sustainable livelihood by providing new market opportunities.
Mazharul Islam said, "This initiative will provide capacity building and training workshops to assist craft producers for improvement of their product design, marketing development and protection of intellectual property rights."
"It will also create an awareness of modern marketing techniques among the artisans and encourage them to produce handicrafts using traditional skills, patterns and themes in an innovative way which ensures the continuity of these traditional skills," he added.
He said that Lok Virsa supports preservation of the dying traditional skills and promote artisans connected with these skills so that they may continue to transfer these arts to the coming generations.
Lok Virsa is a prime institution charged with the mandate for field research, collection, cultural studies, cultural documentation, scientific preservation, study of oral traditions, folklore, indigenous cultural heritage and traditional culture of Pakistan. It is the prime national institution in the country dealing with both tangible and intangible cultural heritage and the research activities on folk and traditional heritage are the top priority for the institution.