Handicrafts of Colombia celebrates its first 60 years

Artesanías de Colombia celebrates its first 60 years of work for the progress of the sector and the preservation of the ancestral and traditional knowledge of Colombia, as an entity attached to the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism.

As a state entity, in recent years Artesanías de Colombia has stood out for the implementation of the Comprehensive Social Management (GSI) program, through which more than 23,000 artisans in the country have been served with business strengthening projects in the productive chain, from co-creation, design and innovation, respecting ancestral knowledge, pondering the being to follow the path of social, economic and cultural development with social justice, environmental and economic justice.

Likewise, the entity has been in charge of providing new opportunities for the craft sector, expanding the offer of fairs and opening stores in cities such as Bogotá, Cartagena and Zipaquirá, leading to the marketing channels of artisanal pieces, making the trades and techniques visible. of that knowledge.

Artesanías de Colombia created the Research and Documentation Center (CENDAR) to preserve the institutional memory of the sector.

The growth of the entity has allowed the development of projects such as the Unique Registry of Artisans of Colombia (RUAC), a statistical information tool that seeks to characterize the artisan and grant the Professional Artisan Card.

Artesanías de Colombia continues to advance in the census of the artisan community, going from having a registry of 33,000 characterized people in 2022, to more than 41,000 artisans registered so far in the year 2024, improving the care provided by the entity in aspects such as training, technical advice in the productive chain with psychosocial attention, in addition, expanding the Denominations of Origin, Trademark Registration, among others.

Another of the great achievements obtained by the entity in recent years has to do with the delivery of 4,000 life insurance policies and protections in favor of artisans, with the aim of continuing to expand their total coverage. It is also important to highlight that through the call “Crafts, territory and total peace” the Entity managed to obtain more than 20,000 artisans registered throughout the country, some of them from all territories.