Yak cheese helping Tibetan nomads

VIDEO from Australia Network News

Yak exports from China

Created: 08/10/2009

Bill Bainbridge

Last Updated: Thu, 8 Oct 2009 23:02:00 +1100

Western China's most abundant resource, the humble yak, are now helping Tibetan nomads.

Farmed in the region for centuries, the yak has been a traditional source of sustenance.

But now, Yaks are also providing luxury fibres and gourmet cheese to some of the world's leading fashion houses and hotels.

They're apart of social enterprises - businesses which aim to achieve social, environmental and financial goals.

Founder of Ventures in Development, an organisation helping yak farmers adapt their traditional skills to a modern economy, Marie So says the social enterprise aims to preserve people's traditional way of living.

"We've tried to work in areas which engage in their own traditional way of living,

For example making cheese, milk, milking and shearing yaks...it's something that they're used to doing, it's something that also preserves the traditional way of living," she said.

"So we're not essentially building a factory and training people up to work in factories, but we really want to maintain people's traditional way of living in their own communities and doing what they are good at doing."

Ms So says the bottom line of social enterprises is that they're not charities but real businesses that trade in real products.

"Getting charity aid is very non-sustainable. Some programs run for two years, some for three years...and lot of these communities have experienced..being cut off from aid...so they don't trust non-profit [organisations]," she said.

Social enterprises, like that of the Yak, are expanding according to the organiser of the Social Enterprise World Forum, Jan Owen.

Ms Owen says the movement has been growing across the world at a rapid rate.

"Alot of people are interested in social enterprises and alternative to charities," she said.

"They're interested in social enterprises as an alternative to welfare provision. It's a much more pro-active and empowering way to not only give people a hand out but a hand up."