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And so the second day of the trip to Bangladesh began…

The first order of the day was a meeting at the BRAC headquarters in Dhaka. If you haven’t heard of BRAC and/or are interested in development practiced in a holistic manner [read: doing anything and everything], I suggest you visit the BRAC website at www.brac.net. BRAC is the biggest development organizations in the world and has the most comprehensive structure I have ever encountered. The development projects are funded primarily through BRAC commercial enterprises & microfinance—it’s an industry, to be honest. But an extremely well thought out and effective industry. Essentially it’s corporate social responsibility in reverse!

I am in Bangladesh for an exposure visit. BRAC has a project called: “Challenging the Frontiers of Poverty Reduction: Targeting the Ultra Poor” (CFPR-TUP) which the World Bank’s microfinance group, CGAP (Consultative Group to Assist the Poor) think is extremely effective and would like to pilot in Pakistan. If the two-year pilot is successful, the project will be scaled to a national level. My organisation is one of three NGOs to be selected to implement the pilot. Its exciting stuff, the idea of the programme is to target the absolutely underprivileged, those who are called “food-insecure” these days (it means exactly like it sounds). This group, the ultra-poor, is unable to even access mainstream development projects because they are so secluded and “un-empowered”. They are not clients of micro credit because they have no means to guarantee payback of even the smallest of loans.

What this project will do is provide a combination of grants, skills trainings, assets and other support services (e.g. health, legal aid) to lift the ultra-poor to a socio-economic level where they are able to develop their enterprises through the aid of traditional microfinance and take advantage of development programmes from which they have been overlooked. Its an interesting idea and, while it is still in its infancy, seems to be successful.

But I digress…before this orientation meeting started; the group took advantage of the opportunity of being on the 19th floor of the BRAC headquarters (it's a 20 story building—unbelievable—more unbelievable, its not the only one) and started snapping pictures of the view of Dhaka. The view itself is very picturesque because the building faces a lake and you see lots of greenery interspersed with lots of buildings. What stops you in your tracks is the view of an enormous slum in the middle of the lake. Rows upon rows of tin roofs closely packed together, the slum is a stark reminder that one is in a developing nation. There are only two visible means of access to the slum, a narrow road track and by boat across the lake (clearly the popular mode of transport considering the number of people using it).

Despite the presence of such slums, Dhaka is a clean city, there are no visible garbage heaps, nor is there much air pollution. The fact that a very large majority of vehicles (including buses and motor rickshaws) all run on CNG is responsible for the latter. CNG is perhaps the most sensible solution to air pollution, it is cleaner and also more economical. It’s not a permanent solution given the non-renewable factor but it's a start. I see it as giving time for renewable sources to become cheaper and more accessible. Of course, the cycle rickshaws (which to my eternal regret I did not get a chance to ride) are also a very important component of a clean environment. Inexpensive and everywhere, they are not a novelty like rides in New York, but rather a very essential part of transport in Bangladesh.

Anyways, while watching the rickshaws and other vehicles navigate the crowded roads of Dhaka, which turned into the narrow highway [the road is one lane on both sides—this is a highway?], I watched in wonder as the miles swept past but the people did not. I do not think there is a single stretch in this whole country that is not populated. After all the population density is 839 people per square kilometre! Bengalis have had to be very smart in making sure that they use up every inch of available land. And they have…throughout the route we saw endless paddy fields, interspersed with maize and other vegetables and [of all things] brick kilns a-plenty. And where there is too much water on the ground, they build their houses on stilts! An amazing resourceful people the Bengalis. Houses in rural areas, for those interested, are made of bamboo which grows everywhere (very strong and good bamboo) with corrugated tin roofs (a cheap material). Sometimes, tin is used for walls as well. I thought that tin was an awful material given how hot it would get in the summer inside such a house but it works out fine because villagers incorporate a false bamboo ceiling within the structures.

But, perhaps the most amazing structure and most visible sign of sophisticated development we saw in Bangladesh was still to come on our long trip to Rangpur; the Jamna River Bridge. It is the largest bridge in South Asia, 5 km long and one of the largest in the world. And phenomenal it is. The river itself is very, very wide (Pakistani rivers are pretty thin and non-navigable except in small boats) and putting a bridge across it is a big feat. We didn’t realise until later that no bridge [of any sort] had existed before on this stretch and people had to rely on ferries to get across. Imagine, the entire population on the northern banks was virtually cut off from the heart of the country until 1997. The northwest block of Bangladesh [therefore, unsurprisingly] is the poorest section of the country. Hence, it is the logical starting point for BRAC’s TUP project.

We also had the opportunity to visit one of BRAC’s seed farms on the way to Rangpur where they produce maize seed for the market. They also have fish hatcheries and sericulture (silk worms) at this institute. It was interesting despite the fact that we saw very little (it was night time when we reached the farm). What was great to see was that many of the employees were women—BRAC is very big on employing women and specially targeting females in all their projects.

I had been observing sophisticated development measures in Bangladesh the whole day and apart from the availability of electricity everywhere, I felt many other things (e.g. sophisticated road networks with large/broad highways for efficient goods transport) were missing. I don’t know whether this is a good or bad thing or what it indicates about Bangladesh as yet but it is an important statement, I feel, about the country’s development.