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The objective of this project is to alleviate poverty in 450 urban communities in seven Pourashavas (Municipalities) and four City Corporations through community empowerment and capacity-building for local governments, NGOs and CBOs. |
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Partner: Government: Government of Bangladesh
Local Authorities: Bogra, Gopalganj, Hobiganj, Kushtia, Mymensingh, Narayanganj and Sirajganj Pourashavas (Municipalities) Civil Society: Chittagong, Khulna, Rajshahi and Baris City Corporations and 450 urban poor communities
International Organizations: UNDP, UN-HABITAT |
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Cost: US$21,324,464 |
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The objective of this project is to alleviate poverty in 450 urban communities in seven Pourashavas (Municipalities) and four City Corporations through community empowerment and capacity-building for local governments, NGOs and CBOs. This is done through direct financial support for community-level basic services and infrastructure, skills training and group businesses managed by town-level teams, local government staff, and a Dhaka-based Project Management Team. The project directly contributes to Bangladesh's Millennium Development Goals and Targets, especially Goal 7, Target 11 on improving the lives of slum dwellers. It is envisaged that at the completion of the project, partner communities will be better off, healthier and more integrated into the physical fabric and the social and economic networks of urban areas and local governments will have enhanced human resource and financial capacity to develop and implement pro-poor policies, which will impact national policies. The strategy is to support communities establish Primary Groups (20 families), Community Development Committees, Clusters of Community Development Committees and town-level federations.
Communities prepare community action plans that identify: needs that can be directly supported by project funds (such as the provision of water supply and sanitation); where the project should play a facilitating role (such as access to health and education facilities); and where the community itself takes action (such as environmental sanitation and social programmes). Provision of basic services and community infrastructure is done on a community contract basis with financial support from a project community development fund and technical support from town teams and local government. Apprenticeship programmes, support to group businesses and other direct poverty alleviation activities are supported by a poverty alleviation fund. Community empowerment is achieved through community-organized savings and credit programmes, within and between town need-based experience sharing, and regional visits by community leaders and professional staff. The capacity of local government and its elected representatives is developed by project-supported training, experience-sharing and through their involvement in the financial, technical and approval processes. The project is actively participating in UN-HABITAT's Global Campaign for Secure Tenure and the Safer Cities Programme.
By the end of June 2004, the project had:
- 458 Community Development Committees with over 103,000 families in the 11 project towns;
- 2,656 savings and credit groups whose total savings were about US$470,000;
- 362 community contracts completed or under implementation that will provide 16,900 twin pit latrines, 1,700 tube wells as well as footpaths, drains, street lights and community halls;
- Proposals for apprenticeship programmes prepared in all project towns;
- Established ward-level Project Implementation Committees and town-level Project Coordination Committees in all towns.
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