Since founding AMONG EQUALS as a not-for-profit fashion brand, we have been focused on empowering some of the most economically-disadvantaged women in Papua New Guinea through trade, by honouring their craft and paying the weavers a premium for their Bilum.

In 2015, we started with 20 weavers, today we count more than 2,000 women in our community – weavers who live in some of the most remote and hard-to-reach regions in PNG. These women are very much the heart and soul of the brand and the relationships we have with them is transparent – they decide which bags to make, and we have become a key buyer of them, supporting them as small business owners and creatives. With each Bilum sold, there is a huge downstream effect. The funds benefit the community directly and we see each Bilum aiding around 10 to 15 people.

Having established a growing network of loyal buyers we are now focused on training and reaching more communities of women – recently, the weavers asked us to implement a training program in order to reach more communities so the industry can further flourish.

Proudly, we are now selling through 12 countries and 52 retailers, our Bilum circle continues to grow.

Florence Jaukae Kamel is known throughout PNG as Bilum Meri, an endearing term that translates to woman weaver or super woman.

In 2015, Florence identified a need for the weavers to expand their knowledge on market challenges and it was agreed that Among Equals would fund community-led initiatives to guide the women to develop skills for the international market. Specifically, this relates to ongoing training on quality control, leadership, delivery timeframes, consistency and preparing the Bilum for shipping.