The Ultra Poor Challenge - I

FE Team | Published: September 15, 2007 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00

Ishrat Firdousi
Hasina was born in Jagathberh village, 6 kilometres from Patgram Upazila, to an extremely poor family. They were seven brothers and sisters and rarely managed to eat three times a day. At age 7, instead of going to school, Hasina was washing dishes at other people's houses. In exchange they would feed her twice a day. But she could never attend school.
At the age of 14 she was married off to a man from Bhandardaha village. After her marriage, her struggles with poverty began anew. A year into her marriage, she and her husband were separated from their in-laws' family. The two were now fighting for existence as never before. And they had children, one by one, four of them. There was no end to their misery and not a day passed when they could manage three meals.
Then in 2004, Hasina was selected to be a beneficiary under BRAC's Ultra Poor Programme. As enterprise she chose the nursery. After a three-day training, a 10-decimal land was leased for the nursery. Hasina was also provided with all the tools she would need to tend a nursery as well as seeds for various timber trees. The seeds were sown. Soon they germinated and grew into saplings tended with utmost care by Hasina.
BRAC personnel made weekly home visits to tutor Hasina on 10 issues relating to health and society - child marriage, dowry, divorce, marital separation, marriage registration, village arbitration system, Vitamin A, water borne diseases, prevention of worms and family planning. Through the "Gram Daridro Bimochon Committee" (Village Poverty Eradication Committee) she endeavoured to solve the problems of others. Slowly, change started coming into her life.
Nine-ten months later, Hasina was selling saplings of mango, jackfruit, neem from her nursery. And every sale made her immensely happy. In fact, the very first day she had sold a sapling she had gone and bought a notebook and a pen for her son. The rest of the money she used for food, and whatever was left, she saved. Today, Hasina has a savings of Tk 6,100. She has already bought a cow with her earnings. The cow has given birth to a calf. She has also leased a piece of land and built a tin roofed shack.
Hasina sends her children to school and has also hired a private tutor for them. She wants to raise them as worthy citizens. She wants to buy a piece of land and build a proper tin roofed house. She wants her children to complete higher studies and live a life of peace and prosperity.
After independence, for over three decades, different government and non-government organisations (NGOs) have been carrying out their different poverty alleviation programmes in Bangladesh most of which were centred on micro-finance.
Today, 20 percent of the country's 14 crore population are living below the poverty line. Of this segment, 17 percent are moderately poor and 38 percent extremely poor. Of the extremely poor, 31 percent are ultra poor or street poor and five percent destitute. Needless to say, this population is living without adequate food, shelter, or a means of livelihood. In most cases these people cannot take part in the development programmes. The mainstream development programmes have covered just 2.6 percent of the ultra poor.
For the socio-economic development of these left out ultra poor populace BRAC initiated the programme "Challenging The Frontiers of Poverty Reduction - Targeting The Ultra Poor (CFPR-TUP) or the Ultra Poor Programme.
The Ultra Poor Programme is being implemented in the most poverty ridden regions of Bangladesh like Rangpur, Nilphamari , Kurigram, Madaripur, Gopalganj, Netrokona, Kishoreganj, Panchagarh, Thakurgaon, Lalmonirhat, Gaibandha, Sirajganj, Naogaon, Chapai Nawabgonj and Rajbari.
Under this programme BRAC has been providing different assets (chickens, cows, goats, tools and seeds for horticulture, nursery, vegetable cultivation and support in non-agricultural activities), assistance in health services, training and social development to 1,00,000 ultra poor women-headed families from 2002 to the year 2006.
This is not micro-credit but straightforward grant. The other part of the programme is to develop a social supplementary force for the ultra poor populace at different levels of the society. It is hoped that this force will make a positive contribution in the journey of the lives of the ultra poor.
According to a survey conducted by the World Bank and Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics 1995-96, the poor people have been divided into different categories. They are as follows:
Poor
Those who consume less than 2122 kilocalorie of food a day.
Extreme Poor
Those who consume less than 1805 kilocalorie a day. In this category they are further divided into two sub-groups:
Ultra Poor
Those who consume less than 1805 kilocalorie a day and they make up about 20 percent of the country's population. (BBS-2003) Destitute
Those who consume less than 1600 kilocalorie. They constitute 5 percent of the country's population.
The beggars, the mentally and physically impaired, and the impoverished elderly people all belong to this category and can be called the destitute populace of the country.
However, a few who covered by BRAC's Ultra Poor Programme have a less than hundred percent success.
Benubala is a landless peasant of Nazir Daha village Kaunia, Rangpur. They live by the wayside on the dam. Because of her parents' extreme poverty she was married off when she was 14. For the same reason she never got any education. Her husband was a fish vendor. There were days when no fish was caught and those days the family starved. This near starvation and hard work made her husband very ill. On top of this they had four children to look after.
When the family were thus trying to stay afloat in their severe struggle, Benubala was selected to be a beneficiary under BRAC-BDP, CFPR-TUP in 2004. BRAC workers told her about the different aspects of the programme and that she had a week to think things over as to what she would like as an enterprise. Seven days later, when they were back, Benubala told them she would like to raise goats. Benubala was then taken to the BRAC office at Haragachh and given a 3-day training on goat rearing.
Then they gave her resources to build a shed for the goats like a CI sheet and bamboo partitions. After the shed was built they provided her with five goats. Benubala was ecstatic.
But her happiness did not last long. Within a month, three of the goats became ill and had to be sold off for only Tk 300 each. This devastated Benubala mentally. BRAC workers consoled her and told her not to lose hope. They reminded her that she still had two goats left and advised her to rear those diligently. Benubala began raising her goats with the utmost sincerity and care. Soon both the goats had a kid each and later Benubala bought back one of the goats she had sold. Today she has five goats but with an ailing husband and four children Benubala has not been able to break the ring of poverty. Her situation is still desperate which is why she still sheds tears of wretchedness.