One House One Farm project to reach 1.2m households by June

The number of households under the 'Ekti Bari Ekti Khamar' (One House One Farm) project is expected to cross 1.2 million across the country by this June, where investment would reach around Tk 15 billion, officials said.

Presently, the number stands at over 0.7 million with investment around Tk 9.25 billion.

Some 35,500 associations have been formed in this connection at upazila level. Savings of the associations stand at Tk 3.9 billion. The government has given Tk 10.12 billion more to them, according to the project sources.

The government recently announced to transform the project into 'Palli Sanchay Bank' with some 483 branches throughout the country.

The process of launching the bank is at final stage, as it awaits parliament's nod, they said.

 "The project is advancing rapidly. We hope that the bank will contribute significantly to the economy," a project official said.

Rural people are taking loans from the fund and developing small projects in various sectors, like - cattle rearing, fish farming, vegetable cultivation, nursery and poultry farms.

The Rural Development and Cooperative Division under the Ministry of LGRD and Cooperatives launched the project to make rural people self-reliant and empower them through motivation, proper training, need-based micro-credit, material support, group building, voluntary enthusiasm and capital formation.

They also said the project would make each household a sustainable income-generating unit through maximum and justified utilization and exploration of resources. Thus it would help reduce the country's poverty rate to 20 per cent from the existing 40 per cent by 2015.

The project is being implemented in all upazilas across the country. But many people are still not aware of it due to lack of proper publicity, officials added.