Development of an Information Flow Model to Overcome the Challenges in Sri Lankan Handicraft Industry

Abstract

The handicraft industry has been an uprising in the past few years in the global market. Digitalization has become a major reason for the growth of the industry around the world. But the Sri Lankan handicraft industry shows a decline over the past few years due to several reasons. There are government and non-government institutes which are responsible for the development and the sustainability of the industry. Their efforts seem to be less effective due to the lack of awareness among the crafters about the work carried out by the stakeholders andthe institutions. The study was conducted to identify the problems in the handicraft industry and to propose an information flow model to mitigate the above problems. Primary data collection was done with one-on-one interviews and circulating a questionnaire. Interviews were done with the industry experts and officers. The questionnaire was given to a sample of 30 artisans. An information flow model for the industry was developed using the analyzed data. This information flow model is a stakeholder centric one and can be used in the future to design digital tools to communicate among the stakeholders more effectively.