Maya Traditions Foundation

Maya Traditions strengthens indigenous communities by supporting the people we serve with the tools they need to elevate themselves out of poverty and preserve their cultural heritage. We believe that fair trade employment is the key to freedom from a life of hopelessness. Our mission is to empower women artisans to be agents of change in indigenous communities through quality employment, affording women especially the opportunity to develop the skills they need to positively impact the world around them. Our reach extends beyond the entrepreneurial world, building both personal character and pride in the artisan’s traditional cultures.

Maya Traditions is a non profit social enterprise, and all our net profit from sales is invested in our social programs that benefit all our partner artisans, such as education scholarships, health, preservation of the Maya culture, professional training, etc. As part of our commitment to developing women artisans to becoming agents of change in indigenous communities, we believe investing in social programs instead of handouts and impositions is key to building confidence in our partner artisans. Through our programs, we believe our partner artisans may receive much needed social benefits while avoiding a state of dependency on long term donations and funding.

Maya Traditions works closely with our partner artisans and has built up a strong sense of trust in the 22 years since our establishment. We take great care in ensuring that our programs are structured to fit the specific needs of the communities we serve. As part of our Artisan Development and Youth Education programs, we provide professional development workshops and seminars to build confidence in prospective entrepreneurs and students alike.

The social programs developed by Maya Traditions since its inception have been the vanguard of providing our partner artisans with the skills and education necessary to become agents of change in their community. Our Youth Education Program has worked to reduce the financial stress of school related expenses faced by the families of our artisan partners. Our Artisan Development Program continues to be an engine of positive growth for our partner artisans by providing fair wages for good produced and supplemented by the aforementioned workshops and seminars focusing on building strong business practices.

We are continuing to expand our programs, particularly our Community Health Program, in order to provide health and wellness education to the communities we partner with. We are also working to provide more education opportunities to the children of our partner artisans, some of which may become the first in their family to attend or complete school.