The Sama women of Tawi-Tawi and Sulu have always been recognized as excellent mat weavers as part of their cultural heritage. The art of mat weaving within the Sama Community has always been restricted to women. Thus, the process involves gathering the pandan leaves, peeling them into thin strips, boiling, pressing the strips with a rounded log known as "entosan" to make them pliable and supple, dying, and weaving the strips into designs that are exclusive to the creativity and skill of the weavers, as no two mats are alike (Romero, 2020). 

Since mat weaving is one of the rich cultural traditions of the women of the Bangsamoro, and as such, Section 24 of RA 11054, the Bangsamoro Organic Law, which established the Bangsamoro Commission for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage, requires  to ensure its preservation. This cultural heritage has to be preserved and as declared by the UNESCO, one approach is by recording it in its tangible form and conserve this in an archive. The second approach is to maintain it in its living form by creating a School of Living Tradition (SLT) to enable it to be taught and passed down to future generations. This approach ensures that the next generation can continue to exist by guaranteeing that indigenous knowledge (IK) is passed on to the younger generation and encouraging culture specialists to continue using their cultural endowment while mentoring and educating younger people.  Moreover, the Sama-Bajau people have a rich oral tradition, but documented histories are scarce.  This makes it challenging to pinpoint the exact origins of the craft.