New vitality in hundred-year-old Co Chat silk weaving village

Bustling craft village

Co Chat village is located next to Ninh Co river with fertile alluvial flats convenient for growing mulberry and raising silkworms.

Co Chat silk weaving village in Ninh Giang commune of Ninh Binh province was formed hundreds of years ago and has been passed down from generation to generation.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the French colonialists built the Nam Dinh Fiber Factory, Co Chat village gradually became the main raw material growing area supplying the factory.

Because the silk in Co Chat village is of high quality, the French colonialists built an additional processing factory in the village to exploit the full potential of this mulberry growing and silkworm raising area.

Duong Duy Lam, head of Co Chat village, shared that the silk weaving profession here has been established for a long time. During the prosperous period, over 90% of the households in the village followed the profession, creating jobs and high income for local people.

However, due to the inability to compete with other silk products on the market, the craft village has developed sluggishly since around 2010, but in the past three years, natural silk materials have been favored by the market again, and large silk production facilities in the village have also been operating more busily.

Doan Thi Hue, owner of a silk spinning facility, shared that she has been involved in the profession for nearly 30 years, from the time when the machines were still rudimentary and completely manual until now, she has switched to modern machines.

Since technology was applied, quality and productivity have also increased, helping to reduce labour costs. On average, each month the facility exports about one tonne of raw silk to markets in Laos and Thailand at a price of 900-1.4 million VND/kg.

Nguyen Thi Yen's family is also one of the households that has been involved in the traditional silk spinning profession in Co Chat craft village. To adapt to the market mechanism, in recent years, in addition to regularly maintaining silk production, they have also done additional work cutting cocoons to collect pupae to sell to restaurants, creating jobs for about 20 local workers.

Building Co Chat silk brand

Due to the increasingly narrowing mulberry growing area, fierce competition from other silk products on the market, and low labour costs, many households in the village have been forced to switch to other occupations.

To contribute to preserving and developing the traditional silk craft, in 2021, artisans in the village established the Co Chat Silk Cooperative, then continuously researched and applied modern science and technology to production to create high-quality silk products.

Tran Thi Ngoc, a member of the Co Chat Silk Cooperative, said that using technology in production will create higher value, more sophisticated and beautiful products, helping to attract more customers. In 2022, the cooperative's traditional handmade silk fabric Chat Silk was recognised by the provincial People's Committee as meeting the 4-star OCOP standard, creating a strong push, creating momentum for the product to reach a wide range of customers.

To build the Co Chat silk brand, in addition to investing in machinery and improving product quality, the Co Chat Silk Cooperative has also focused on promoting products on social networking platforms such as establishing a website, Facebook, Youtobe, Tiktok as well as increasing product sales through e-commerce platforms.

In addition to raw silk products exported to foreign markets, the cooperative has also focused on fashion garment products from natural silk.

According to Pham Thi Minh Hai, Director of the Co Chat Silk Cooperative, today's consumer trend increasingly favors natural silk and fabric products, so the cooperative has constantly innovated and created many products such as clothes, sheets, pillows and blankets made from 100% natural silk to suit modern consumer tastes.

After the merger, the administrative scale is larger, the craft village is connected to a wider distribution network and consumer market, and is supported to bring products to fairs and exhibitions to enhance the brand.

To preserve and promote the value of traditional craft villages, helping people feel secure in their commitment to the profession, local authorities plan to increase product promotion; research on connecting cultural tourism tours with craft villages.

Nguyen Hong Son, Vice Chairman of the People's Committee of Ninh Giang commune, said that identifying craft village development as one of the tasks for economic development, the locality will plan craft villages, maintain mulberry growing areas, and encourage farmers to return to mulberry and silkworm cultivation.

At the same time, there is a plan to repair and upgrade infrastructure systems such as roads, infrastructure to develop craft village tourism, thereby helping people have more income, creating motivation to continue preserving and developing traditional crafts./.