The Salvation Army and Fair Trade are perfect for each other. The Salvation Army can help people to help themselves, providing a secure and stable future for them and their families.

During the first graduation ceremony at the training centre of The Salvation Army’s knitting factory in Savar, Bangladesh, there were lots of smiles and tears.

Twenty women had completed their course and were ready for employment. Textiles are Bangladesh’s main foreign export earner. The women who received their certificates should be able to earn a living.

The group of women were dressed in their most colourful saris. Their hair was neat. Bangles and earrings completed the picture. Prior to this they were sex workers in the horrid brothels or on the narrow and crowded streets of Old Dhaka.

Half way across the world, a successful businessman from Norway managed a company that invented a process whereby recycled clothes that couldn’t be sold, even as rags, were processed into yarn. The yarn was used to knit socks and sweaters at a knitting factory in Norway.

Why couldn’t the knitting be done in Bangladesh? This unlikely scheme had never been done before and The Army in Bangladesh didn’t have a knitting factory.

With a Board of Investment registration in Bangladesh, a project manager from Norway and the promise of yarn from Norway the project had a great start. The Salvation Army in Savar became a miracle while facing difficulties on several fronts. It was proof that the impossible can happen.

When ladies came for their first working day they looked out of place. They wore make-up and dressed the way they had in the brothel. Few could read, write or count. The training would have to be very basic and thorough. It would take a lot of effort.

At the graduation ceremony girls who had not been able to read and write proudly read to each other the simple text of their training certificates. They cried tears of joy. Their old life was behind them and they had a new start..