UNITED PURPOSE BANGLADESH NEWSLETTER

United Purpose has provided skills development training in jute and cloth bag production to women’s business centre entrepreneurs in Jamalpur district. The jute and cloth bag training provides the women with greater opportunities for self-reliance and additional skills, all while promoting agroecology-based Bangladeshi products.

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

New year greetings from Bangladesh, where we have been busy developing a new five-year strategy focused on supporting women- and community-led enterprise.

In this newsletter we thought we’d share some of the exciting personal stories of hope and change that have emerged from our various projects. Hear how our ‘Integrated support for the lifelong success of orphaned children in Bangladesh’ (SOFOL) project is helping transform the lives of vulnerable children, and meet the women benefiting from our efforts to promote disability-inclusive development through our women’s business centres .

We’ll also be showcasing our newly-launched Aqua4All-funded pilots, which are exploring models of women-led sustainable management through community water schemes and the marketing of water filters for indigenous communities in the remote Chittagong Hill Tracts.

In other news, our team has expanded since our last communication with you. We are delighted to have marketing specialist Tahsin Mahmud on board to lead the marketing of products produced by our ‘Nari Jhuri’ social enterprise network.

We hope you enjoy this update.

Warm Regards,

Sriramappa Gonchikara Country Director

United

Purpose Bangladesh

United Purpose Bangladesh’ s mission is to move people ‘beyond aid’.

In line with this, and to contribute to organisational aims of alleviating poverty, social inequality and the impact of climate change, in Bangladesh it has been providing livelihood, support to women entrepreneurs for years. And this focus on communityled, market-based and entrepreneurial approaches will remain the basis of United Purpose Bangladesh’s approach for the next five years.

To ensure people have sustainable access to nutritious food, clean water, decent employment and incomes, while sustaining natural resources, United Purpose’s new five-year strategy positions its community partners, particularly women and young people, as established change agents for wellbeing and leaders in sustainable, climate-adaptive socioeconomic development. While addressing a recent strategy-planning workshop with staff, Sriramappa Gonchikara, Country Director of United Purpose Bangladesh, called on his team to apply the last five years of experience and learnings to the launch of its new social enterprise network, Nari Jhuri, which aims to enable women entrepreneurs access to new forms of capital.

“In COP-21, it was agreed that Bangladesh is one of the most vulnerable countries [to the effects of climate change],” he said. “This is an opportunity to develop a strategy for community-based sustainable models that will help communities mitigate and adapt to the impacts of climate change. For the next five years, water, sanitation and hygiene, health, and nutrition, will be critical issues for Bangladesh. An enterprise-based, women’s business centre model offers a sustainable model to address many of these issues at a community level.”

The United Purpose 2023-2027 strategy was developed by the team based on their critical observations, experiences and learnings in four thematic areas: social inclusion, human rights and governance; social enterprise, climate change adaptation and resilience; and wellbeing. Accelerating actions towards the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2023 has the potential to transform the lives of people in Bangladesh. With this in mind, UPB’s 2023-2027 strategy will be aligned with and contribute to the SDGs, and it will address ‘Vision 2030’.

United Purpose has provided skills development training in jute and cloth bag production to women’s business centre entrepreneurs in Jamalpur district.

The jute and cloth bag training provides the women with greater opportunities for self-reliance and additional skills, all while promoting agroecology-based Bangladeshi products. As the world moves to tackle environmental pollution, particularly the use of plastic, polythene and other nonrecyclable items, jute and biodegradable products offer a solution. Women’s business centre members and those involved in the Nari Jhuri initiative could help reduce pollution by supplying more of these jute and biodegradable cloth products and constitute a major development in women entrepreneurs’ economy.

Papia had dreamt of training to become a nurse. But when her father, Kandara Chakma, died leaving her mum, Tapasi, to raise her alone, money was tight and hopes of obtaining an education faded.

That is, until Papia and her mother discovered the SOFOL project. Launched in December 2021, SOFOL provides financial and in-kind support to orphaned children like Papia so they can continue their education. Papia received a wellbeing kit that included a chair, table, water filter, and solar lamp so she could study effectively, as well as monthly financial support to cover her education expenses.

At SOFOL’s 21st learning centre, Papia also gained knowledge on leadership, nutritious food and other life skills from volunteers who provide orphaned children with additional life skills, such as creativity, leadership strategic thinking etc.

Meanwhile, her mum gained training in homestead gardening and received equipment including quality seeds, vermicompost, bio-pesticide and a pest and disease-control spray through the SOFOL project, aimed at helping her generate income. She puts some of the money she makes selling the various vegetables she produces including spinach, beans and gourd, and gourd – towards Papia’s education. Despite challenging early years and financial hardship, Papia has excelled in her secondary school examinations and is now back on her chosen career path.

“My dream is to become a nurse, so I could serve my community people,” she said. Villagers are also celebrating the young girl’s success. Her village leader (locally called Karbari), Babu Shantimoy Chakma, said: “Papia is industrious. We are happy to see she has succeeded in her exam. She told us that SOFOL project has played a significant role on the path of her success. I would request SOFOL projects to continue their support for orphaned children and vulnerable children’s future as they are currently doing.”

The SOFOL project is working on a sustainable solution for school-going and non-school-going students in three upazilas of Khagrachhari Hill District. It has established 65 learning centres for orphaned students, with a focus on participants' future development by enhancing the four ‘C’ s’ - communication skills, collaboration, creativity and creative thinking. By combining all of these skills, students are empowered to solve their own problems by working together to come up with solutions.

Our Team, Our Strength

Tahsin Mahmud has joined United Purpose as a Business Development and Marketing Manager. He is trained in business development with in-depth understanding of users, requirements gathering, and market trends. He will work to promote Nari Jhuri social enterprise in Bangladesh as sustainable brand and promote environmentally friendly products, services, and initiatives. He has started working to develop business strategy for growth and marketing product produced by rural women entrepreneur.

With the support of the Coca-Cola foundation, we are promoting the inclusion of people with disabilities in efforts to stimulate community health and economic recovery.

Our SHER (Sustainability towards Health and Economic Recovery) project aims to enhance collaboration between relevant stakeholders, including different service departments, to reduce social inequality and enable greater independence. From March 2023, six children with disabilities will receive government disability allowance after the SHER project helped their families collect the necessary documents and submit them to the social welfare department.

Other highlights of the SHER project so far include:

• Nine people with disabilities received blankets to protect them from the cold

• One person received a wheelchair and two other people with visual impairments received mobility canes (locally called ‘Shada Chori’)

• Nine people with disabilities are due to start receiving Government disability allowance following advocacy and administrative support

• One child is listed to receive long-term medical treatment, with SHER project staff advocating an appropriate allowance is assigned

The economic empowerment initiative:

• Identified vulnerable families who would benefit from income-generating support

• Advocated relatives of people with disabilities receive economic development training from Upazila Disability Rehabilitation Department so they can provide financial support. The training will start in March 2023

Raising public awareness of earthquake risks and consequences in Bangladesh remains a priority.

To identify gaps in public knowledge about quakes, our “SUPER” consortium participated in a 10-day national small- and medium-enterprise fair 2022 between 24 November and 3 December 2022. The aim was to increase communication about the hazards, assess perceptions and vulnerabilities, and intensify public-private partnerships in disaster risk management.

Entrepreneurs , development professionals and peoples across the business community better understood private sector involvement in the disaster risk reduction programme after visiting the stall. They are well oriented with the “Private Sector Emergency Operation Center (PEOC) and it’s working procedure on disaster preparedness and emergency response coordination system.

The fair offered an opportunity to accumulate data about the public’s awareness and perceptions of earthquake consequences and risks. This information will enrich our understanding of current knowledge level and help design an appropriate and effective project that will create an earthquake-resilient business community.

Moreover, most SME entrepreneurs are operating their businesses from home where fire safety levels are insufficient. The project team therefore ran a practical simulation exercise for the business community and visitors, which ran for approximately an hour at the fair under the tagline ‘fighting fire with bare hands’. Visitors from different communities, as well as entrepreneurs, learnt ways to reduce the impact of fires.

Bangladesh is at significant risk of recurring natural and human -induced hazards. Every year, on average, 10 million people are affected by floods, cyclones, land slides, river bank erosion, water-logging, drought, tornadoes and more – all of which significantly disrupt Bangladesh's economy and the lives and livelihoods of its people.

Our LEAN (Leadership to Ensure Adequate Nutrition) project supports communities in reducing disaster risk in Chittagong Hill District. In focus group discussions and plenaries in this area -namely in Bandarban, Khagrachhari and Rangamati – hazards identified included landslides, waterlogging, storms, prolonged and heavy rainfall, earthquakes, droughts, fire, thunderstorms and animals, such as wolves and rats. Some of the causes for these are man-made, such as deforestation, hill cutting, road construction and over-population. Analysis indicates that disaster largely affects the poor and vulnerable, who live in hilly areas.

The LEAN project targeted 77 unions which were preparing disaster risk reduction action plans based on village-level data and information. Union-level disaster risk reduction action plans and validation workshops have already been organised, facilitated by the local authorities and community residents with LEAN project support.

Village data has successfully been analysed, compiled and shared with a union disaster management committee for the preparation and validation of a risk reduction action plan that can be implemented within the community.

To implement the risk reduction action plan, community-based organisations supported union parishads to incorporate risk reduction actions in their annual development plans (ADPs). Community-based organisations also advocated implementing some of the actions with the resources from public service agencies, such as the Department of Agriculture, Department of LGED, the Livestock Department, the Department of Public Health and Engineering, and the Health Department.

Recommendations from participants:

• There is an opportunity to strengthen the functionality of union disaster management committees in hill locations and to implement mitigation measures amid the hill communities

• After the finalization of the CRA report, a copy must be kept at union parishad and Upazila, with district disaster management committees to be properly informed

• This CRA process enables unions to explore possible sources of funding for projects and actions

Accessing sustainable, safe water is a challenge for people living in remote areas of the Chittagong Hill Tracts.

To address this issue, women’ s business centres and a project trialling innovative financing for upland water management have been demonstrating appropriate enterprise-based, women-led, community water supply models, as well as market-based approaches for household filters, to ensure sustainable safe water access to remote and lowincome residents in Barkal Upazilla from Rangamati Hill District.

The project, which has successfully completed its inception phase, is now preparing for implementation. It will provide clean and safe water access to 1,059 homes (more than 6,000 people). Here are a few of the progress highlights so far:

• The project design is drawn and a Bill of Quantity (BoQ) for water schemes in place

• Businesses have been identified to sell water filters in Rangamati and Barkal Upazila

• Effective and efficient coordination has been established with relevant stakeholders along with links to the businesses that will sell the water filters

• An operations and maintenance plan has already been developed for communities’ year-round safe water access