Creating Knowledge for Africa's Development

We at BRAC realize that creating useful knowledge and making it work for poverty alleviation is a critical challenge for Africa. Knowledge becomes useful when it contributes to solving problems. This is possible when it is contextual, internally driven and evolves through application and critique.

With this goal in mind, BRAC in organizing a one-day conference on Creating Knowledge for Africa's Development in Kampala on January 14th, 2010. The forum is organized in partnership partnership with the MasterCard Foundation and Brooks World Poverty Institute at the University of Manchester in association with the Ministry of Finance and Planning - Government of Uganda, Economic Policy Research Center at the Makarere University, and UNICEF.

The one-day forum will feature prominent speakers including Margret Kakande, Ministry of Finance and Planning (Government of Uganda), Prof. David Hulme (University of Manchester), Dr. Sharad Shapra (UNICEF Representative in Uganda), and Dr. Sarah Ssewanyana (Makerere University) and many other prominent academics and practitioners engaged actively in Africa-focused research.

Please join us at the conference if you happen to be in Kampala. The draft conference agenda is available here.

Two Recognitions in Pakistan of BRAC's Work

BRAC Pakistan received the Humanitarian Excellence Award from RAKz Communications (Pvt) Ltd.

We are also humbled by a public display of appreciation (photo below) by the people of Mohibanda, a village in Pakistan's Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province that was fully damaged by the floods. The message on the wall speaks of the villager's appreciation to BRAC and the Bangladeshi people and their hopes of farms and nurseries in Mohibanda flourishing because of new water pumps installed by BRAC as part of our flood rebuilding efforts there.

As 2010 draws to a close, BRAC Pakistan's work continues in full swing to rebuild the lives of people in flood affected districts like Mohibanda. Current ongoing activities include livestock distribution (to help restore livelihoods of those who depended on raising cows and goats), home repair assistance, financial services, WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene), and more.

This is still a time of great need in Pakistan, and BRAC's commitment to our poverty alleviation mission there remains unchanged. We are grateful for your continued support of BRAC. Click here to donate.

Changing lives in Afghanistan and around the world

I want to share with you an article published by Reuters yesterday about Afghanistan. Unlike most of the news I've read about Afghanistan lately, this story has a message of hope - of positive change that is happening right now - and how BRAC is a part of it:

Safia, 32, took out a BRAC small business loan for 70,000 Afghanis ($1,555) so she could improve her beauty shop in the Kabul neighborhood of Polisukhta. A large vase with fake pink flowers adorns the window of Stara Beauty Parlor, where Safia and her employee do hair and make-up.

Safia had to ask permission from her husband to get the loan, but said her success had earned her more respect from him.

Posters of heavily made-up women with elaborate hairstyles decorate the shop walls and a thin curtain in the front window hides customers from people passing on the busy street outside.

"When I got the money it helped me to do a lot of work in my shop," said Safia, a mother of two. "I will be able to make an independent future."

Safia is one of hundreds of thousands of women in Afghanistan who are changing their lives with BRAC's help with loans as small as $100 or as large as their ambition. What's more, they are changing how women are perceived and treated in their communities, including by providing health care and investing in education for girls.

BRAC is helping millions of women in Asia, Africa, and now in Haiti change their lives, their families, and their communities for the better. Together, we're touching more than 138 million lives, but we can't do it without your help.

Click here to make your year-end gift to BRAC, and help us change even more lives. You only have a few more days to have your gift count for 2010! BRAC USA is a 501(c)(3) organization, and your gift will be fully tax-deductable.

Best wishes,

Susan Davis
President & CEO
BRAC USA

P.S. Remember, you can also multiply your gift.

Realizing Potential: Ulfat's story

Ulfat was just starting to feel the ground beneath her feet when, last July, life dealt Ulfat another hard blow. Born in the Nowshera district in the Kyber-Phaktunwa province, Ulfat was married off at 22, and divorced a year later because she did not produce a child within the first year of marriage. Upon her return to her father's house, Ulfat was determined not to let her circumstances get the better off her. She started helping her father by taking care of the family buffalo and selling the milk. To generate some additional income, Ulfat also started a small tailoring business from home.

Like most women living in South Asian rural communities, Ulfat has been a dependant all her life. First, her father supported her and upon being married, she relied on the support of her in-laws. When Ulfat's husband divorced her, she was back to living under her father's roof. Ulfat longed to be independent and do more for her family by starting a dairy business. This seemed like a daunting task, considering she did not have the money to buy a buffalo. Then she heard about BRAC from people in her village and decided to become a BRAC Microfinance client. In March 2010, the BRAC Microfinance branch in Akerberpura, gave Ulfat a loan of 12,000 Rs (USD 140 approximately). Coupled with her small savings from her tailoring business and the loan from BRAC, Ulfat was able to buy a buffalo.

Ulfat had just started selling the milk from the buffalo and generating a small income, when the devastating floods in Pakistan robbed Ulfat of all her dreams. Not only did Ulfat and her family lose their home and all their possessions, they also lost their way of sustenance. The gushing waters from the merciless flood, forced Ulfat and her family to leave their home and evacuate to dry land. They became homeless and started lived on the side of a road. They were unable to eat and went hungry most days. During this period, Ulfat and her family received assistance through BRAC's relief program. BRACs ReliefAssistance Program provided them with a thousand rupees, food packets, medicine, water purification tablets, mosquito nets, bedding, and access to toilets.

Eventually, Ulfat and her family returned to their hometown to discover that the flood had washed away everything they owned, and all trace of their home had disappeared. They turned once more to BRAC for assistance. BRAC gave Ulfat a second chance by providing her with another loan to restart her dairy business. Ulfat bought another buffalo in November and has started selling milk again. The buffalo is currently producing 10 liters of milk a day, which Ulfat is able to sell at 50 Rs. per liter. The buffalo recently gave birth to a calf so eventually Ulfat anticipates increasing her income. Ulfat is hopeful for the future and thankful to BRAC in assisting her and her family at some of the most critical times in her life.

BRAC's mission is to "empower people and communities in situations of poverty, illiteracy, disease and social injustice. Our interventions aim to achieve large scale, positive changes through economic and social programs that enable men and women to realize their potential." Ulfat is a quintessential example of the unyielding human spirit, which continues to strive for a better future in the darkest of hours. With assistance from BRAC programs, Ulfat and millions like her start their journey of realizing their own potential.


Click here to learn more about BRAC programs in Pakistan.

Great Non Profits recognizes BRAC as a Top-Rated Nonprofit for the year 2010

We are pleased to inform you that BRAC has been named to a new list of top-rated nonprofits by GreatNonprofits, the leading provider of user reviews for nonprofit organizations.

The top-rated nonprofits list is composed of organizations that have received at least ten positive reviews from stakeholders, such as volunteers, donors, or clients. The reviews were posted as part of the “Top Rated Nonprofits 2010” campaign conducted by GreatNonprofits, in partnership with Guidestar and a coalition of nonprofit organizations.

"We are gratified to be able to honor BRAC for its work on a multitude of issues including poverty alleviation and women’s empowerment" said Perla Ni, CEO of GreatNonprofits. "They deserve to be recognized for the support they have from their community of stakeholders."

Thank you to everyone who helped us win this honor by writing reviews of our organization. We deeply appreciate you taking the time to do so, as these reviews will be useful to us in many ways going forward. You can read the reviews and add your own at www.GreatNonprofits.org and www2.guidestar.org.

Thank you again for your support!

BRAC Wins the 2009 SAFA Award for Best Presented Accounts and Corporate Governance Disclosures

On December 12th, 2010, BRAC received a 2009 SAFA Award at the Hotel Soaltee Crowne Plaza in Kathmandu, Nepal. BRAC won the SAFA Award in the category of Non-Governmental Organizations for the Best Presented Accounts and Corporate Governance Disclosures. Mr. Surendra Pandey, the Honorable Minister for Finance of the Government of Nepal, was the Chief Guest in the Award Giving Ceremony. Mr. S. N. Kairy, BRAC's Director of Finance and Accounts, received the award on behalf of BRAC.

The SAFA (South Asian Federation of Accountants), as a forum of professional accountancy bodies, is committed to positioning, maintaining and developing the accountancy profession in the SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) Region and ensuring its continued eminence in the world of accountancy. The SAFA Awards are conferred on the basis of evaluation administered by SAFA's Committee for Improvement in Transparency, Accountability and Governance, of the published annual reports of entities from South Asian Countries.

Aid Workers in Afghanistan Debate on NY Times; What BRAC is Doing

The New York Times yesterday published a piece about the security and dangers faced by non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Afghanistan (Link to article). There is no question that security is the #1 challenge to BRAC's work in the country. But since we first began operations in 2002 after being invited to work there, BRAC has become the largest NGO operating in Afghanistan. It is a fairly unique form of South-South collaboration in Afghanistan in the area of poverty alleviation that we are very proud of.

In response to the debate portrayed in the article, we would like to offer in this blog an update of what we do in Afghanistan, and how we do it.

Some At-A-Glance Summary Data of our work in Afghanistan:

- BRAC works in all 34 provinces of Afghanistan, a country with a population of over 28 million people.

- With an operating budget of over US$30 million, BRAC runs programs in microfinance, health, education, agriculture & livestock development, local capacity building & training, and more.

- BRAC has also started BRAC Bank Afghanistan, a full-service bank with a focus on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

- BRAC employs over 3,000 staff members. Of that figure, over 2,900 are Afghani staff. The remainder are expatriates from BRAC Bangladesh who bring in sector expertise. Of the 2,900 national staff, more than 1,100 are women.

- To maximize impact, BRAC is keen to scale up existing programs and introduce new ones.

- BRAC University in Bangladesh has graduated Afghanis who have returned to Afghanistan to manage BRAC programs there (yet another example of our "South-South collaboration"),

Some of you may already know all this. With respect to how we do our work, we'd like to draw on an excerpt from Nicholas Kristof's blog from about 2 months ago:

October 21, 2010, 12:56 am

Aid Groups' Advice in Afghanistan

By NICOHLAS KRISTOF

"I asked several NGO’s for their advice on how to work in insecure or Taliban areas. Their advice was remarkably consistent, all about consulting local people and getting buy-in from them. And of course that’s good advice whether it’s an aid organization in the South Bronx or in southern Afghanistan."

"Here are excerpts of what they said. Susan Davis of BRAC wrote:

Deliver value — what people want and need.
Deliver what works cost-effectively.
Work in a culturally sensitive way (live in same community, pray in same mosque)
If possible, build institutions with staying power.
Care. Don’t be afraid. People one serves are one’s best protection."

These values are not unique to BRAC's work in Afghanistan. We do the same in every country where we operate in Asia, Africa, and Haiti.

"I have started to distribute goats"

Photo Credit: BRAC Pakistan

Even with the relatively quiet coverage by the international press on Pakistan flood rehabilitation, the fact still remains that this is still a time of tremendous need in Pakistan. 2,000 people have died from the floods, but in the flood-affected communities the death toll could rise if the related destabilizing threats are not tackled – water-borne diseases, food insecurity, destroyed economic opportunities that need to be restored, children who lost their schools, and homelessness at the onset of winter. In short, the UN Secretary General called this situation a “slow-moving titanic.”

In the face of such dire assessment, what make us hopeful is the resiliency of people in the flood-affected communities where we work. Informed by BRAC’s experiences with post-natural disaster work in Bangladesh and elsewhere, BRAC has fully embarked on rehabilitation work in Pakistan.

Our note today from our flood response manager says “I have started to distribute goats to flood affected families. Cow distribution will be started after a week.” Many flood victims depended on poultry and livestock for their livelihood until they were washed away by the floods. With your support, we have started an asset recovery program of poultry and livestock for such families. In essence, BRAC has commenced an element of its traditional Target Ultra Poor program where the ultra-poor - i.e. those who are too poor for microfinance - are given an asset (like livestock) and trained to generate income off that asset.

With the end of Qurbani Eid (the feast of sacrifice) the prices of livestock have fallen substantially in the market, which will enable our funds in the asset recovery program to go farther. Our starting targets are distribution of 600 goats and 300 cows. The need is still immense and we have to scale this up. With your support we will, inshallah (an oft-used phrased by Muslims which mean "God willing").

Rehabilitation work in other areas continues apace, the most significant being the fresh new liquidity that our microfinance program is supplying to BRAC members. Our target is to originate over $1.5 million in flood loans to flood affected BRAC members to assist with their livelihood recovery. To encourage farmers to plant during the just-passed Rabi season, BRAC has distributed over 30,000kg of wheat seeds.

BRAC first made a long-term commitment to Pakistan in 2007. We reiterated our long-term commitment to Pakistan last September, pledging to fundraise and carry out over $17 million of flood rehabilitation and livelihood development in areas of microfinance, agriculture, health, and WASH over the next 5 years. With 2010 ending and 2011 only a few weeks away, we are dedicated to scaling up our work in the country to maximize our impact. Please continue your support with a donation to BRAC (https://www.brac.net/donations/view).

Book Release: "From One to Many: Scaling Up Health Programs in Low Income Countries"

"From One to Many: Scaling Up Health Programs in Low Income Countries" published by The University Press Limited was recently launched. The book is an excellent resource for anyone interested in learning about both the problems and the opportunities involved in effectively scaling up health programs. The book is a collection of articles submitted to the International Conference on Scaling Up Health Programs, held in Dhaka, Bangladesh in December 2008.

This edited volume is comprised of 17 chapters, two of which focus specifically on BRAC's efforts and successes in scaling up maternal health programs as well as the rural tuberculosis program.

In the foreword, Founder and Chairperson of BRAC, Sir Fazle Abed, writes, "the problems of poverty and disease are immense, therefore so should be the scale of the solutions." This edited-volume takes a deep look at many of the health care problems faced by the world's poorest, and provides a framework for understanding the challenges and opportunities within the field.

"From One to Many: Scaling Up Health Programs in Low Income Countries" has been released in Bangladesh, Germany and Switzerland and was edited by:

• Richard A. Cash: Senior Lecturer at the Harvard School of Public Health,Visiting Professor at the James P. Grant School of Public Health at BRAC University; BRAC USA Board Member
• A. Mushtaque R. Chowdhury, Associate Director at the Rockefeller Foundation, Professor at Columbia University in New York
• George B. Smith, Food Systems Expert
• Faruque Ahmed, Director of the BRAC Health Program

Rights Awareness and Action for Women in Bangladesh

The chorus serves as a beacon as we follow a narrow, undulating path, flanked by very meager but clean huts. As it opens up into a clearing we behold a colorful tableau of brightly dressed women sitting in a circle dutifully reciting the legal dictates that gives them access to justice. This is one of BRAC's Human Rights and Legal Education (HRLE) Classes.

The HRLE classes are operated through BRAC's Human Rights and Legal Aid Services which started its journey in 1986 by providing legal education to BRAC's microfinance members. In 1998, it became a complete legal service program by adding the alternative dispute resolutions (ADR) mechanism and legal assistance for poor women and children in court proceedings. At present BRAC’s HRLS program has 541 legal aid clinics in 61 districts across Bangladesh that provide legal aid services to women suffering from gender-based violence and discrimination. The HRLE classes have taught over 3.4 million women across the country.

While Bangladesh is on track to achieving the Millennium Development Goal of ensuring gender parity, discrimination against women is still culturally entrenched. The HRLS program aims to create awareness amongst women of their rights and entitlements, and provides legal aid services to enable them to access those right and justice.

The HRLE class today is being taught by Lutfa, a "Shebika" or a community paralegal, and the topic for the day is Inheritance Law. Lutfa has a lot of pride in her job as an HRLE Shebika, and has a very inspiring story. After being trained by BRAC, she utilized her knowledge to help her husband claim his share of his father's property. She also leveraged her enhanced social standing and negotiated with him to have the land jointly titled with both their names -- a rare feat in a country where women are effectively excluded by social and customary practices from direct access to land. The Inheritance Law, which differs by religion, being studied today is indicative of this. According to Islamic law, daughters inherit half as much as sons, while under Hindu law, a widow, or all widows in a polygamous marriage, inherits the same share as a son. Moreover, due to cultural norms Bangladeshi women are unlikely to claim their share of family property unless it is offered to them.

Jaya, a young Hindu girl, sporting a large bindi on her forehead and a three old child on her lap, laughed sardonically when asked if she would inherit any property. “My father will beat me, if I even suggested it”, she said.

Fatima, clad in a bright pink sari was not hopeful either. “I don’t want to fight with my brother over land. I can’t afford to severe ties with him”, she explains. “What if my husband brings home another woman and throws me out? Then where will I go with my children, if not to my brother’s house”.

In rare cases of triumph, such as with Lutfa, the land has given her a sense of security and she's invested her own money to rent a plot of land and run a school for orphaned and abandoned children. It's given her a social standing in the community that she's never had.Lutfa is an ideal role model for the women in her community, and through the class she’s inspired and fostered a collective sense of purpose, action and hope within the women she teaches.

Jamila, the matriarch of the class of 25 women proudly told me how she led her community in stopping the marriage of an underage girl. “We sent the groom back on his horse” she told us, “he could not even get to the bride's house.”

Tania, a shy and pretty seventeen year old smiled when she heard this. “My father wants to marry me off. I came to the HRLE class in the hope that they can help me too.”