Terms of use

1. About these terms

This website, botswanabasket.org (the site), is run by Botswana Basket Collective (BBC, we, us), based in Ngamiland and the Okavango Delta, Botswana. You can reach us at info@botswanabasket.org.

These terms apply to everyone who visits or uses the site. By using it you accept them. If you do not accept them, please do not use the site. Our privacy notice explains how we handle personal information and forms part of these terms.

2. This is a preview, not a shop

The site describes a marketplace that is still being built. It does not sell anything, take orders or payments, open accounts, or verify certificates. Nothing on the site is an offer to sell, an invitation to buy that can be accepted, or a promise to supply any product or service.

When the marketplace opens it will have its own terms of sale, which will govern any purchase. Nothing on this site forms part of a contract to buy a basket.

3. Dates and plans can change

1 March 2027 is the date we are planning to open the shop. It is a target, not a commitment. The opening may be postponed, brought forward, staged so that some features arrive later than others, or changed in other ways, including for reasons outside our control such as funding, regulatory approval, payment providers, logistics or the needs of the weavers we work with. Countdowns on the site are calculated from the planned date and change if it does.

The features described on the site (including weaver and cooperative accounts, payouts, trade accounts, certificate verification and the shop itself) describe what we intend to build. They may launch in a different form, later, in some places and not others, or not at all.

Please do not make commitments, purchases or business plans that depend on a particular opening date or feature. To the extent the law allows, we are not responsible for any loss that results from relying on one.

4. Figures, examples and photographs

• Figures. The share of a basket’s value designed to go to artisan production (55%) and the share of each sale planned for community and biodiversity funds (5%) are design targets of the model we are building. They are not guaranteed results, projections of income for any person, or a promise about any particular sale, and they may change before or after the shop opens.
• Sample certificate. The Mark of Origin shown on the site is an illustration of the format. The weaver’s name, cooperative, region and basket ID are placeholders and do not describe a real person or basket.
• Photographs. Photographs on the site are illustrative. They may not show members of the collective, their work, or the places they live.
• Descriptions. General descriptions of the craft, the communities and the region are offered in good faith as background and are not exhaustive.

5. Information on the site

The site is general information. It is not legal, financial, investment, tax or professional advice, and it is not an offer of shares, investment, employment or funding.

We work to keep the site accurate, but we provide it as it is and as available. To the extent the law allows, we make no promise, express or implied, that it is complete, accurate, current, free of errors or viruses, or available without interruption. We may change, suspend or withdraw any part of it at any time, without notice.

6. Our name, mark and content

The Botswana Basket Collective name, the woven mark, the logo, the site’s text, design and layout belong to BBC or the people who licensed them to us. Photographs belong to their owners. Basket patterns are the cultural heritage of the weavers and communities who make them.

You may view the site and share links to it, and print or save a page for your own non-commercial use. You may not copy, reproduce, adapt or sell the mark, logo, patterns, photographs or text, or use our name in a way that suggests we endorse you, without our written permission. Nothing in these terms gives you any licence to our trade marks.

7. Using the site fairly

You agree not to:

• use the site in a way that breaks any law, or for fraud or deception;
• pretend to be BBC, a weaver, a cooperative or anyone acting for us, or claim a connection with us that you do not have;
• try to gain unauthorised access to the site, its servers or any connected system, or interfere with how it works, including by introducing malicious code or by overloading it;
• scrape, harvest or copy the site’s content in bulk, including to train or test software, other than ordinary search-engine indexing.

8. Links and email

Where the site links to another website, we do not control it and are not responsible for its content, availability or privacy practices.

The contact links on the site open your own email program. Writing to us does not create a contract, a partnership, an agency or any obligation to supply or buy. We will try to reply to every message but cannot promise to.

9. Our liability to you

The site is free to use. To the fullest extent the law of Botswana and any other law that applies allows:

• we are not liable for any loss or damage arising from using, or being unable to use, the site, or from relying on anything on it, including any planned date, feature or figure;
• in any case we are not liable for loss of profit, revenue, business, opportunity, goodwill or data, or for any indirect or consequential loss;
• where we are found liable despite the above, our total liability to you for all claims connected with the site is limited to five hundred pula (P 500).

Nothing in these terms limits or excludes any liability that cannot lawfully be limited or excluded, such as liability for fraud, or for death or personal injury caused by negligence, and nothing affects the rights you have as a consumer under the law of Botswana or of the country where you live that cannot be waived by agreement.

10. If you misuse the site

If you break these terms, you are responsible for the reasonable losses, costs and claims that BBC suffers as a direct result, to the extent the law allows us to recover them.

11. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms, for example when the shop opens or the law changes. The date at the top shows when they last changed. The version on the site when you use it is the one that applies; if a change is significant, we will say so on the site.

12. Law and disputes

These terms, and any dispute about them or the site, are governed by the law of the Republic of Botswana. The courts of Botswana have jurisdiction, though if you live elsewhere as a consumer you may also be able to bring a claim where you live.

If something goes wrong, please write to us first at info@botswanabasket.org; most problems can be settled that way.

13. General

If a court finds part of these terms unenforceable, the rest still applies. If we do not enforce a term straight away, we can still enforce it later. These terms are the whole agreement between you and us about the site. You may not transfer your rights under them; we may transfer ours to an organisation that takes over the site.