To mark International Women’s Day (March 8), Apollo Tyres inaugurated a rubber sheet making unit in southern India for the wives of rubber tappers that is to be run by the women and will provide them with income generation opportunity.
The rubber sheet making unit in Vellavoor Panchayat in Kottayam, Kerala, was inaugurated by Adv S Jayasooryan, vice chairman of the Rubber Board of India, in the presence of the Panchayat president, other Rubber Board members and the team from Apollo Tyres.
The rubber sheet making unit will be run by a group of women that have been trained by Apollo Tyres, in association with Rubber Board of India, in rubber tapping, sheet making, sheet smoking and general entrepreneurial skills. They have also been linked to the rubber dealers to directly market their produce from the unit.
Apollo Tyres initiated this project to empower women and increase their family income, and to get better quality rubber sheets as raw material for the business. Apollo Tyres plans to replicate this model soon in other Panchayats of Kottayam.
In the last two years, Apollo has reached out to nearly 600 women in Kottayam, who had very little or no income, and provided them with alternate sources of livelihood.
This initiative is a part of the tire maker’s Women Empowerment Programme, which is targeted toward providing livelihood skills to underprivileged women in and around the company’s manufacturing facilities in Kerala and Gujarat.
March 14, 2018
