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BRAC Research

BRAC

Research and Evaluation Division

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Editor Hasan Shareef Ahmed Copyright 2005 BRAC May 2005 Publisher: BRAC BRAC Centre 75 Mohakhali Dhaka 1212, Bangladesh E-mail : research@brac.net Fax : 880-2-8823542, 8823614 Telephones : 9881265, 8824051, 8824180-87 Website : www.bracresearch.org Cover design: Shajedur Rahman Photo credit: Nasima Akter (p 26) BRAC (p 2, 20, 23 top) Nuzhat Choudhury (p 6 top) Khondaker Hasibul Kabir (p 6 bottom, 12) Mizanur Rahman (p 19) AKM Masud Rana (p 16)

BRAC/RED publishes research reports, scientific papers, monographs, working papers, research compendium in Bangla (Nirjash), proceedings, manuals, and other publications on subjects relating to poverty, social development, health, nutrition, education, gender, and environment. Printed by BRAC Printers at Tongi, Gazipur, Bangladesh

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CONTENTS Preface v Acknowledgements vi Introducing BRAC 3 Growth and development of RED 7 Research highlights 13

Poverty alleviation, empowerment and human well-being 13 Health 15 Agriculture, food and nutrition 17 Education 19 Environment 21 Other studies/activities 22 Ongoing studies 24

Capacity Development 28 Support extended to others 30 Dissemination of research 33 RED seminar in 2004 34 Presentations in conferences, seminars and workshops 37 Publications in 2004 39 Abstracts of reports and papers completed in 2004 42 Glossary 58 Index 61

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PREFACE ‘BRAC Research 2004’ is the eighteenth annual report of the Research and Evaluation Division (RED) of BRAC. The salient features of BRAC research conducted in 2004 and the major activities of RED are documented in this report. Established in 1975, as an independent multi-disciplinary research and evaluation unit, RED works within the framework of BRAC. Abstracts of completed studies and published papers are included in this report. A list of more formal internal and external publications is also included. Copies of these reports and publications are available in the Ayesha Abed Library, BRAC University, 65 Mohakhali Commercial Area, Dhaka 1212. A list of acronyms and abbreviations used in this report appears at the end of this report. Readers wishing to make any comments on this report or would like to have copies of this report or more information on RED activities may please contact Director Research, BRAC, BRAC Centre, 75 Mohakhali, Dhaka 1212, Bangladesh (e-mail: research@brac.net). This report is also available on the website of BRAC RED (www.bracresearch.org) and in compact disc.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The Research and Evaluation Division (RED) is supported by BRAC’s core funds and funds from donor agencies, organizations and governments worldwide. Current major donors of BRAC and RED include Aga Khan Foundation Canada, Aus Aid, Campaign for Popular Education, Canadian International Development Agency, Columbia University (USA), Danish International Development Agency, Depart-ment for International Development (DFID) of UK, European Union, the Global Fund, Government of Bangladesh, Hospital for Sick Children (Canada), ICDDR,B: Centre for Health and Population Research, NORAD, NOVIB, OXFAM America, Rockefeller Foundation, Royal Netherlands Government, Save the Children (USA), SIDA, UNDP, UNICEF, and the World Food Programme. RED received wide support and cooperation from all divisions of BRAC, particularly from the field staff and the people of Bangladesh without whose sincere support and patronage no field research could be conducted smoothly. RED also received useful comments, suggestions, and guidance from researchers, reviewers, and editors from within and outside the country, which helped improve the quality of research and research outputs. RED is indebted to BRAC management for its continued support.

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Introducing BRAC

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The members of a BRAC village organization (VO) are seen refunding their loan instalments in a weekly VO meeting in their courtyard. BRAC staff collects the money and records the transactions in their passbooks. The VO meetings are the lifeline of rural development activities of BRAC.

A dancing sequence in a BRAC NFPE school. Co-curricular activities are essential component of BRAC education system.

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Introducing BRAC

BRAC vision

A just, enlightened, healthy and democratic Bangladesh free from hunger, poverty, environmental degradation and all forms of exploitation based on age, sex, religion, and ethnicity.

Just after the liberation war of Bangladesh BRAC was established in February 1972 as a relief organization to help rehabilitate the war-affected people of Bangladesh. BRAC was formerly known as Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee. Gradually it has turned its focus to poverty alleviation and empowering the poor, particularly women and children, through organizing and mobi-lizing the poor, providing awareness and skill development training and education, mobilizing their savings, giving them collateral-free micro-credit, and help gener-ate employment for them. BRAC works with people whose lives are dominated by extreme poverty, illiteracy, disease, and other handicaps. With multifaceted develop-ment interventions, BRAC strives to bring about positive change in the quality of life of the poor people of Bangladesh. BRAC firmly believes and is actively involved in promoting human rights, dig-nity, and gender equity through poor people's socioeconomic, political and human capacity building. BRAC tries to bring about changes at the national and global level policies on poverty reduction and social progress.

BRAC has evolved as one of the largest private development organization in the world. Its multifaceted development inter-ventions are extended to 4.86 million house-holds in over 68,000 out of 86,000 villages and 4,378 urban slums in all the 64 districts of Bangladesh. Since January 2000, BRAC has been implementing a new programme called ‘Challenging the Frontiers of Poverty Reduction/Targeting the Ultra Poor (CFPR/ TUP)’ to bring the ultra poor women into development programmes who have not yet been covered by any development interven-tions. BRAC gives them income earning assets, skill development training, and healthcare services to overcome their extreme poor condition. BRAC Education Programme (BEP) is specially targeted to children of BRAC members who never went to school or dropped out at some point. With special emphasis on girls, BRAC non-formal pri-mary education (NFPE) is for 8-10 years age group and the BEOC (Basic Education for Older Children) model is for 11-14 years age group. The unique feature of BRAC model is that one teacher teaches in one-room school the five-year primary education curriculum in four years by reducing the

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number of holidays and increasing contact hours. Currently BRAC runs 31,619 non-formal schools with 1.50 million students (65% girls) enrolled. The health, nutrition, and population interventions aim to cater for the health needs of the poor people throughout the country through 29,736 community health volunteers known as Shasthya shebikas, 2,284 community health workers, 48 static health centres called Shushasthya (meaning good health), and 11,988 community nutri-tion workers. A total of 653,366 pregnant women received antenatal care, 209,307 patients received treatment from Shushas-thya, 36,209 patients got TB treatment, and 649 patients received services from the BRAC Brace and Limb Centre during 2004. The BRAC Health Programme covers 31 million people of the country through its Essential Health Care, 82 million through TB Control Programme, and 13 million under National Nutrition Programme. BRAC has developed a number of programme support enterprises to support its pro-poor development interventions. These enterprises include eight centres of Ayesha Abed Foundation (handicraft training and production centers), eight Aarong shops (marketing outlet for rural artisans), a large

modern offset printing press, a cold storage, the second largest liquid milk plant in Bangladesh, 12 chilling plants, six poultry farms, three poultry feed mills, two seed processing plants, a tissue culture labora-tory, 24 nurseries, 12 sericulture hatcheries, an iodized salt factory, 12 fish and prawn hatcheries, and a bull station for artificial insemination. The other support services include research, training, monitoring and internal audit. BRAC has expanded its activities in 17 of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan to help the war-affected poor people in their quest for reconstruction of Afghanistan. As of December 2004, BRAC has organized 72,804 poor people in 3,689 village organi-zations and disbursed US$ 7.49 million in micro-credit. A total of 73,000 students are enrolled in Accelerated Learning Project and 2,753 students are enrolled in 83 community schools. BRAC is also providing health services through 23 fixed health clinics. Two training centres are being operated by BRAC in Kabul. BRAC runs its programmes and activities through 32,652 full-time staff and 65,412 part-time school teachers, spending over Tk. 14 billion (US$ 245 million).

BRAC at a glance as on 31 December 2004

Staff 32,652 School teachers 65,412 VO members 4.86 million, mostly women Loan disbursed to the poor (cumulative) US$ 2.59 billion (Tk. 133.21 billion) VO members’ savings (cumulative) US$ 130.89 million (Tk. 7.657 billion) Primary schools 31,619 Pre-primary schools 16,019 Students enrolled in BRAC schools 1.50 million Community nutrition workers 11,988 BRAC Health Centres (Shushasthya) 48 Training Centres 19 Expenditure in 2004 US$ 245 million (Tk. 14.49 billion) Donor support 23%

[Source: BRAC annual report 2004]

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Growth and Development

of RED

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Jochana Chakma, a research assistant, collecting data from an ethnic minority household in Rangamati hill district. The respondent lady is seen breastfeeding her child while smoking tobacco using a dhapa (locally-made bamboo hookah).

Data collection through participatory wealth ranking at the participants’ courtyard.

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Growth and Development of RED BRAC’s relief distribution at Roumari in Kurigram district in 1974 – a badly affected remote rural area during the severe famine of 1974 in Bangladesh – was disrupted. Then John Henry of Oxfam conducted a study and found that some powerful local people hindered the relief activities and they were grabbing the relief materials. BRAC adopted some remedial measures and modi-fied the programme. Thus, BRAC felt the need of a research unit at BRAC to provide continuous research support to its pro-grammes. BRAC formed the Research and Evaluation Division (RED) in 1975 with one statistician only as an independent unit within its framework to provide necessary research support to BRAC programmes. The first study was conducted in 1976 through a survey in Sulla, Sylhet in collaboration with the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies and ICDDR,B: Centre for Health and Population Research. RED was formally established in 1978. In the 1980s, RED expanded its research activities through undertaking a longitudinal and a number of ad hoc studies on Oral Therapy Extension Programme (OTEP). OTEP taught 12 million rural mothers how to prepare oral rehydration solution and treat diarrhoea at home. Another longitudinal study, the Watch Project, was initiated in 1986 in three unions of Manikganj district to monitor changes in health and demographic indi-cators that are expected to be the outcomes

of BRAC interventions. The coverage was expanded in 1987. To make it nationally representative, it was expanded to 70 villages in 10 districts. The decade of 1990s saw a major breakthrough of research, dissemination, as well as non-research activities at RED. A number of small and large scale studies were conducted to see the impact of BRAC’s intervention both at village and programme participant levels. The first comprehensive impact assessment study (IAS) was done in 1993 to gain a more detailed and extensive understanding of the socioeconomic impact of BRAC’s rural development programme on its participants. The IAS was repeated in 1996-97 and 2000-2001. Assessment of Basic Competencies – a simple education assessment tool – was dev-eloped at RED through which the graduates of BRAC’s non-formal primary education were assessed. Nationwide Education Watch initiated to periodically assess the quality of primary education in Bangladesh. Impact of BRAC’s in-house staff training was also assessed through a methodology developed at RED. Multi-country collaborative studies were conducted with renowned institutions/ universities around the world on health, nutrition, demography, education, and agri-culture. On request from the Bangladesh government and the World Bank, RED conducted a large scale survey on Jamuna Multi-purpose Bridge Project to identify the

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affected people and assess their economic loss and another project to compensate the erosion and flood affected people due to construction of the said bridge. A baseline survey of Chittagong Hill Tracts was done after signing the Peace Treaty to know their development needs before initiating any intervention in the three hill districts. Some studies were also conducted on the loss and damages caused by the nationwide devas-tating flood of 1998. A number of studies were conducted on the arsenic contamina-tion of ground water and tested different mitigation options. During the decade, RED also organized some national and inter-national conferences like universal primary education in Bangladesh, global health equity, and anthropology of health and health care. Dissemination activities also expanded during the decade like formal publication of research reports in the form of journal articles, books and book chapters, monographs, and working papers. Disse-mination of research findings at field level for BRAC field staff got momentum. RED carried out a series of studies on BRAC’s CFPR/TUP programme since 2002 that include baseline survey, process docu-mentation research, mid-term evaluation, and early assessment various components of the programme. Based on these studies a baseline report, five working papers, some journal articles, and a research preview series were published. Some of the major research on BRAC programmes during the recent years (2001-2004) include gender barriers in tuberculosis control, reproductive health and disease control, neonatal care and early childhood development, arsenic mitigation and safe water supply in rural areas, membership overlapping, environmental factors in poultry rearing, evaluation of nurseries, basic competencies of NFPE students, assessment of pre-primary graduates and APON programme. Besides research on BRAC programmes RED conducted/initia-

ted some major research on national low birth weight and anaemia survey, iron supplementation during pregnancy, multiple micronutrients supplementation to adoles-cent girls, skilled attendance at delivery among poor women, birthing practices, Kangaroo mother care approach for LBW babies, and elderly health. Agricultural studies include verification of rice intensification system, hybrid rice, and maize and seed production. Other studies include food security and food consumption, survey of people affected due to construc-tion of Mohakhali flyover for compensation, wider impact of micro-finance, post-election communal violence, and continuation of nationwide survey of primary education in Bangladesh. Programmatic research RED’s primary mandate is to conduct research on BRAC programmes. RED usually undertakes short-term evaluation studies, longitudinal and impact studies, baseline surveys, and action research. The findings of BRAC research help achieve programme objectives through modifying and/or improving the programme strategies and identifying new programmatic issues. Others also find BRAC research useful for policy and academic purposes. Major studies done in 2004 are highlighted in the following chapter (p13). Collaborative and commissioned research RED also undertakes research in collabora-tion with different research institutions/ universities around the globe. Most of the collaborative studies are on important devel-opment issues with particular focus on developing countries. Some multi-country studies are also underway. In addition, RED also undertakes commissioned research. RED initiated/conducted 18 collaborative and 12 commissioned research in 2004. Of these, 17 were completed and the rest are ongoing. A list of the collaborative institu-

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tions with the respective study/project titles is given below in alphabetical order: Aga Khan Foundation Canada BRAC-AKFC learning partnership programme - Imran Matin ANTRIEP * Successful school management - Samir R Nath, et al. (Commissioned research) Campaign for Popular Education, Dhaka * Education Watch 2003: literacy situation in Bangladesh - Samir R Nath, et al. (Commissioned research) Research on out of school children - Samir R Nath Columbia University, USA Targeting low arsenic aquifers for community and private wells in Bangladesh - M Jakariya, et al. Emergence Energy Inc., USA Project Emergence - Nasima Akter European Commission Primary health care in later life (PHILL) - Syed Masud Ahmed, et al. Government of Bangladesh (GoB) Bangladesh Environment Management Project (BEMP) * Pollution free Tangail – a demo pilot project at Mirzapur - M Jakariya, et al. GoB, ESTEEM (Effective Schools Through Enhanced Education Management) * Case studies of quality in Bangladeshi primary education - Samir R Nath, et al. (Commissioned research)

Hospital for Sick Children, Canada The development of an effective sprinkles social marketing strategy and effective distribution model for controlling iron deficiency anaemia among infants and young children in Bangladesh - Fazlul Karim, et al. (Commissioned research) Effectiveness of flexible administration of sprinkles in a mixed population of anaemic and non-anaemic infants and young children in rural Bangladesh - SM Ziauddin Hyder, et al. (Commissioned research) Efficacy of daily and weekly home fortification of weaning foods with sprinkles among infants and young children in Bangladesh - SM Ziauddin Hyder, et al. (Commissioned research) IDS, Sussex, UK * Exploring emerging areas of microfinance impact: study on BRAC’s health insurance pilot scheme - Fazlul Karim and Shantana R Halder * Exploring emerging areas of microfinance impact: wider impacts of microfinance organisation through group dynamics -Imran Matin, et al. * Exploring emerging areas of microfinance impact: tracing wider impacts of MFIs in the rural financial market -Imran Matin, et al. INDEPTH Network * Health equity study (eight country study) - Abdullahel Hadi and M Showkat Gani Non-communicable disease surveillance project - Abdullahel Hadi

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Maxwell Stamp * Char livelihood programme - Imran Matin (Commissioned research) Micronutrient Initiative, Canada, Tufts University/Cornell University, USA, Institute of Child Health, UK * Micronutrient beverage supplementation for adolescent girls at non-formal schools in rural Bangladesh - SM Ziauddin Hyder, et al. (Commissioned research) Population Council, USA Community-based kangaroo mother care to prevent neonatal and infant mortality - M Iftekhar Quasem Proctor and Gamble, USA * Testing of arsenic removal technology invented by Proctor and Gamble - M Jakariya, et al. (Commissioned research) Rockefellor Foundation, USA Bangladesh health equity watch (BHEW) (jointly with ICDDR,B) - Syed Masud Ahmed, et al. Save the Children (USA) BRAC initiative to improve neonatal health in Bangladesh - Abdullahel Hadi SIDA Arsenic in tubewell water and health consequences - M Jakariya, et al. SRI/PETRRA * Verification and refinement of the System of Rice Intensification (SRI) project in selected areas of Bangladesh - AM Muazzam Husain, et al. (Commissioned research)

UNDP/WB/WHO’s TDR * Gender barriers to TB control programme (a multi-country study) - Fazlul Karim (Commissioned research) UNICEF * Early childhood development (ECD) - Syed Masud Ahmed, et al. UNICEF, BBS (GoB) * National survey on low-birth weight and anaemia including urban areas and Chittagong Hill Tracts - SM Ziauddin Hyder, et al. (Commissioned research) World Bank * Arsenic in drinking water and birth outcome - M Jakariya and MA Quaiyum Sarkar World Health Organization * Household and economic burden of tobacco usage in Bangladesh - M Iftekhar Quasem ____________________ * Already completed Research output RED has produced 974 research reports and papers until 31 December 2004. Copies of these reports are available in bound volumes in the Ayesha Abed Library at BRAC University, 65 Mohakhali Commercial Area, Dhaka. In 2004 RED initiated 9 new studies and continued 64 studies carried over from the previous years. Of the total 73 studies conducted in 2004, 35 were completed during the year. The abstracts of the completed studies are available in this report (p42) as well as in the RED website (www.bracresearch.org). The list of BRAC research reports and papers, some selected publications and this year’s annual report are available in the RED website.

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Dissemination RED disseminates its research findings among its various stakeholders at different levels. The findings of BRAC research are published in prestigious journals worldwide. Fifteen original research papers were pub-lished in national and international journals in 2004. Some of the journals that published the findings of BRAC research during the year are (in alphabetical order): Bangladesh Education Journal International Journal of Environment and Pollution International Journal of Paediatrics International Journal of Health Promotion and Education Journal of International Development Journal of Transcultural Nursing Public Health Nutrition BRAC researchers contributed two books and 17 book chapters during the year. Popular version of some research results were also published in newsletters and newspapers. A list of publications appears on page 39. Twenty-one research papers were pre-sented in various conferences, seminars, and workshops (p37). Summaries of major findings and important activities were also posted on display boards at 19 residential training venues of BRAC all over the country. In 2004, RED arranged 30 in-house seminars to review study proposals and share preliminary findings (p34). Research compendium Nirjash – a research compendium in Bangla – is published in lucid language primarily for the field implementers of BRAC programmes at grassroots level. One issue of Nirjash was published in 2004. Nirjash is also distributed to other NGOs in Bangla-desh, concerned government departments,

libraries, and media for wider dissemination to share the findings of BRAC research. Working paper and baseline report An extensive report on two comprehensive baseline surveys done in 2002 and 2003 and five working papers on CFPR/TUP pro-gramme were published for wider disse-mination. Newsletter RED publishes a quarterly newsletter – RED Update to keep people updated about its ongoing activities and significant achieve-ments. Four issues were published in 2004. Billboard RED maintains billboards at all the residential training venues of BRAC scattered all over the country. The billboards are updated frequently with the recent key research findings, publications, and other activities of RED. Management and finance The research and dissemination activities at RED are decentralized. Under the overall supervision of the Director discipline-wise research units conduct research under the leadership of Unit Coordinators. Several research units are overseen by the Research Coordinators. Currently there are 10 Research Units at RED, such as extreme poverty, micro-enterprise, social develop-ment, health, health and human well-being, gender and reproductive health, nutrition, education, environment, and population and development. As of 31 December 2004, RED has 40 researchers, 7 professional and support staff, and 52 project staff, 34% being female. Besides, 9 researchers were on study and long leave.

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In 2004, RED spent US$ 0.35 million (Tk. 20.77 million), 68% of which came from BRAC’s core funds and the remaining raised from external collaborative research, consultancy, and commissioned research projects.

Obituary M Ghulam Sattar, Manager, Administration and Projects, died of cardiac arrest on 27 August 2004 at the age of 72 at BIRDEM hospital in Dhaka. He left behind his wife, three sons and four daughters, and a lot of friends, relatives, and well-wishers. He joined BRAC/RED on 22 November 1989.

Pictorial representation of wealth ranking used to select the ultra poor in CFPR/TUP programme.

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Research Highlights POVERTY ALLEVIATION, EMPOWERMENT AND HUMAN WELL-BEING CFPR/TUP programme An exploratory study of the determinants of change in the lives of TUP members This is an exploratory study carried out in 2004 on the TUP members, who joined in 2002, on their perceptions of change, the differences and its determinants. The study combined mini-survey, participatory change ranking, and in-depth case studies. The main variables that were important in determining the ranks were food security status, home-stead land security, health status of the adult earning members of the household, age, and household’s demographic structure. The findings of this exploratory study will be used to develop the instruments for a larger mid-term assessment. Case studies of struggling TUP members Based on participatory change ranking of a sample of TUP members who joined the programme in 2002, detailed case studies were carried out on those who were ranked the lowest. In the change ranking exercise, 18% of the members were categorized as witnessing ‘very positive’ changes, while 28% as ‘struggling’. Detailed case studies on 12 such TUP members suggest that initial household demographics including age and physical ability of the TUP members should be better assessed to ensure an appropriate

enterprise selection. The quality of TUP member’s relationship with her husband also emerged as an important factor. Sector scan of TUP enterprise The study aims to compare the performance of different enterprises provided to the ultra poor members to identify key determinants of enterprise sustainability the likelihood of SUP sustaining their initial enterprise as an ongoing source of income after the withdrawal of BRAC programme support. Both qualitative and numerical data were collected through the FGDs. The relation-ship between investment requirements and risk was found to be a key determinant of enterprise sustainability along with house-hold and social support, and BRAC programme policy and support. Enterprises with high risk and high investment were more likely to be discontinued by TUP members. Cow rearing followed by non-farm enterprises were consistently ranked as the most suitable enterprises for TUP mem-bers. Poultry rearing and vegetable cultiva-tion were considered to be most unsuitable due to high investment and risk. Social capital baseline survey The CFPR/TUP programme, through its Gram Shahayak Committees, attempts to facilitate the creation and strengthening of

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social capital of the ultra poor. A survey was carried out to get a baseline understanding of the social capital of the ultra poor. The survey covered a sample of the year 2002 and 2004 ultra poor members of the CFPR/ TUP programme. For comparison, sample of ‘not selected ultra poor’ and women from other wealth groups were also surveyed. The information was collected both at household and village levels from 90 villages through survey and focus group discussions. The data are being analyzed. Gram Shahayak committee: the membership profile The Gram Shahayak Committees (GSC) are formed with local elite to create an enabling environment for the ultra poor. What are the socioeconomic characteristics of the GSC members? How successful are they in mobi-lizing resources and what are the determi-nants of such success? These are some of the questions that were addressed in a research on 160 GSCs operating in the 2002 TUP villages. We found that the GSCs were formed with people having quite dense social networks. They include quite edu-cated people from the village. The GSCs are not only working towards helping the selec-ted ultra poor, but many are already dis-cussing and some already have taken actions to help other poor people in their villages. They are also mobilizing resources from a diverse range of sources. Food consumption survey A study was carried out on changes in food consumption status among the ultra poor households who joined the programme in 2002. Four hundred households were sur-veyed. Not selected ultra poor were included as control group. Seven-day food frequency, 3-day and 24-hour recall methods were used. To test the validity of 24-hour recall method, 10% households were resurveyed to measure actual weight of the food con-sumed.

Vegetable cultivation by the ultra poor A study was carried out on the vegetable cultivation under the CFPR/TUP pro-gramme in Jaldhaka and Syedpur upazilas in Nilphamari district. The study aimed to explore the marketing system and identify problems of vegetable cultivation by the ultra poor in the long run. Data were collec-ted from the whole population (79) of own financed TUP vegetable growers who were in the “unsubsidized” cycle of vegetable cultivation. The major vegetables were cauliflower, bottle gourd, potato, beans, and brinjal out of 33 species cultivated by the TUP members. The average land under cul-tivation was reduced in the “unsubsidized” cycle and the marketing channel also changed. The growers became more market oriented and more middlemen were involved. The growers preferred land access through mortgage rather than lease arrange-ments. Delivering inclusive microfinance with a poverty focus: experiences from BRAC This is a case study on how BRAC delivers inclusive microfinance with a focus on poverty alleviation. Inclusive microfinance means different types of financial services addresses to different types of target groups that include ultra poor population as well as non-poor people in addition to traditional NGO target groups. The study is based on how BRAC has managed to serve various market segments – the poorest, the poor and the non-poor – with microfinance, but always having at the core a poverty focused argument, thinking, strategizing and moni-toring. Technical assistance to baseline survey of Char Livelihood Programme The Management of DFID and GoB's Char Livelihood Programme (CLP) requested RED to provide technical assistance in designing its baseline survey. CLP is a

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seven-year programme that aims to halve extreme poverty in the riverine chars (small island on the river) of Bangladesh by 2015. Study on the profile of small ethnic groups in Bangladesh RED has initiated a study on the small ethnic groups in Bangladesh. The study is being conducted in two steps. The first step is a national census of the groups. The second step will be an in-depth investigation of each of the groups identified through the census. The analysis will be multi-dimensional in nature providing information on all aspects of their lives. The findings will help assess their development needs and plan a holistic development intervention for their well-being.

Insecure living: voices of the evicted slum dwellers of Kalyanpur Intending to explore the situation of slum eviction and condition of the evicted slum dwellers RED conducted a study at Kalyanpur slum area in Dhaka city. The study investigated the evicted slum dwellers' coping mechanism with the incident, their resistance against it, stance of local power structure, NGO activities during and after the eviction, standpoint of media, and evicted slum dwellers' perception towards the role of NGO and media. Participant observation, interview, and small group discussion were the key tools of conducting the study.

HEALTH National low birth weight and anaemia survey 2003 RED conducted the national low birth weight (LBW) and anaemia survey 2003 in collaboration with the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) of the Government of Bangladesh and UNICEF. The anaemia prevalence survey was conducted in urban areas of the country and also in the rural areas of the three districts of Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT). The LBW survey was con-ducted nationwide. The survey shows that the prevalence of LBW (<2,500 g) in Bangladesh was 33.7%, while the prevalence of very low birth weight (<1,500 g) was 1%. Parents’ edu-cation, father’s occupation, household assets and modern amenities, type of dwelling house and sanitation were found associated with the prevalence of LBW. Mother’s age and height, parity, and intake of iron tablet during pregnancy were also found asso-ciated with LBW. Pre-term delivery (<37 weeks) was also strongly associated.

The prevalence of anaemia in both slum and non-slum areas of urban Bangladesh was highest among children aged 6-59 months (56%), followed by pregnant women (41%), non-pregnant women (34%), and adolescent girls (29%). The prevalence was lowest among adolescent boys (17%). In CHT, the anaemia situation was worse. Here also, the prevalence of anaemia was highest among children aged 6-59 months (62%), with infants (6-11 months) having 90% anaemia prevalence which gradually decreased with increasing age. Adolescent boys were affected (40%) as much as girls (50%). Professor Harun KM Yusuf and Farhana Haseen of BRAC presented the key findings in a workshop held in Dhaka on 22 March 2004. Study on non-communicable diseases A research project titled ‘Identifying non-communicable disease risk factors in Bang-ladesh’ has begun in December 2004. Using the WHO standardized STEPS approach, the

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study will assess the level of risk factors of non-communicable diseases, identify the socioeconomic and regional disparities, and develop a surveillance module of such diseases. Funded by the INDEPTH Net-work, this project is expected to be completed by November 2005. Kangaroo mother care study launched BRAC and the Population Council, USA initiated the main study of the Kangaroo Mother Care (KMC) approach in four rural upazilas in November 2004. The study aims to see the potential impact of skin-to-skin care for the low birth weight babies. A pilot study, conducted in 2002, showed the feasibility of adaptation of KMC approach by rural Bangladeshi mothers. This four-year project aims to help reduce infant

mortality in countries like Bangladesh where the incidence of LBW is high. Follow-up survey of child-to-child component of the ECD programme To measure the effect of child-to-child intervention over time, a KAP survey was done to record benchmark information about the knowledge of adolescents on early child-hood development (ECD) before the inter-vention began. Data were collected from three areas where both ECD and child-to-child approach is in place, areas having ECD programme alone, and a non-interven-tion area. This was also backed by a small qualitative study. The child-to-child compo-nent began in 2002 and ended in December 2004. A follow-up survey is being carried out.

Sabina Akter, a field investigator is seen interviewing a boy at his home in Sherpur district to collect information for the follow-up survey of the Early Childhood Development programme.

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Mid-term survey of CFPR/TUP on health issues The intervention of CFPR/TUP programme has completed the first cycle of 18 months (July 2002-Dec 2003). A mid-term survey on health and related issues were done in 2004 to explore changes in health and nutrition of ultra poor household members following intervention, if any. The findings of the mid-term survey were presented at BRAC donors’ meeting and the report is under preparation. BHEW enters in the second phase The first phase (Jan 2001-Jun 2004) of Bangladesh Health Equity Watch (BHEW) was completed in June 2004 in collaboration with ICDDR,B, Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, and Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies. During the first phase, two surveys were done across all the BRAC's surveillance areas to monitor the status of health equity. In the latest survey, a newly designed poverty mapping tool was introduced to examine its validity. Based on the findings of the surveys, three working papers were published and findings of the research were presented in different national and international seminars, workshops and conferences. The second phase of BHEW activities will continue till February 2006. PHILL intervention closes The project PHILL (Primary Health Care in Later Life: Improving Services in Bangla-desh and Vietnam) aimed to improve the health status and quality of life of older people through involvement of primary

health care providers, communities, care-givers and the older people themselves. Interventions to improve social and health awareness on elderly issues through a life-cycle approach, and management of their common illnesses began in October 2003 in sadar sub-district of Chandpur (with a control population in a neighbouring sub-district). Conscientization workshops, court-yard meetings, participatory workshops, popular theatre, household visits and elderly self-help groups were used to disseminate health and nutrition education, health management know-how, and demonstrate preventive health practices such as exercises, etc. Audio-visual materials were developed and used widely to aid in the process. Following the formal closure of active intervention in December 2004, there will be a pause of three months following which an impact assessment will be carried out. An international conference will be hosted in November 2005 by BRAC on behalf of the project partners to disseminate the learning from the project. INDEPTH Network meeting held Dr Abdullahel Hadi, Research Coordinator of RED attended a meeting of the INDEPTH Network on 22-24 November 2004 in Bangkok, Thailand. INDEPTH is an inter-national association of demographic and health research projects in Asia and Africa of which the Watch Project of RED is a member. The objective of this meeting was to develop a protocol to conduct a cross-country study in fertility change in south and south-east Asia. The outcome will be pub-lished in the form of a research monograph.

AGRICULTURE, FOOD AND NUTRITION Study on the efficacy of home fortification of weaning foods with sprinkles RED conducted a study to investigate the efficacy and effectiveness of sprinkles inter-

vention, on either daily or weekly basis, in improving the anaemia status of young children in Bangladesh. In collaboration with the Hospital for Sick Children, Canada the study was carried out on 12-24 months

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old children in 13 villages of Kaliganj upazila under Gazipur district. The inter-vention was given for 8 weeks in both weekly and daily dose groups. At the end of the intervention 54% of the children from both daily and weekly groups advanced from anaemic to non-anaemic state. The intervention was found to be well accepted by the mothers. The most commonly reported benefits were increased children's appetite, active participation in playfulness and reduced disease episode. Sprinkles also promoted a healthy weaning practice. While sprinkles should be available to the general population, efforts should be made to reach the poorest section of the society through special programmes. A workshop on “Home fortification of weaning food with sprinkles: a new strategy to control iron deficiency anaemia among infants and young children” was held on 11 February 2004 in Dhaka. The workshop reviewed the interventions in controlling iron deficiency anaemia, shared experiences of the ongoing sprinkles project, and formulated a strategy of home fortification to improve iron and other micronutrient con-tents of weaning foods. Fifty-one parti-cipants representing governmental, non-governmental, UN and international agen-cies in Bangladesh attended. The workshop was jointly organized by the Institute of Public Health Nutrition, Government of Bangladesh and BRAC, and sponsored by the Micronutrient Initiative, Dhaka and Hospital for Sick Children, Canada. Formative research on micronutrient sprinkles A formative research to identify social marketing and distribution strategy for micronutrient sprinkles in Bangladesh is in progress. A trial was conducted among 335 households for two months of whom 22 rejected to receive sprinkle. In-depth inter-views were carried out among the compliant

and non-compliant mothers. Based on the first trial, another trial will be carried out to finalize the marketing and distribution strategy, and to explore cost of sprinkles, and willingness/ability to buy. A workshop was held in Dhaka on 23 February 2004 to design the formative research. Seventeen participants from differ-ent organizations attended the workshop. Different tools were developed and refined. Flexible administration of micronutrient sprinkles RED has recently initiated a new colla-boration with the Hospital for Sick Children, Canada to test a flexible administration of micronutrient sprinkles. The objective of the study is to control iron deficiency anaemia among infants and young children through increasing flexibility in dose administration and compliance in a real life setting. Three different doses will be tested using a com-munity-based cluster randomized clinical trial. The doses are: a) use of 60 sachets of sprinkles in 60 days; b) flexible use of 60 sachets over 90 days; and c) flexible use of 60 sachets over 120 days. The study is being conducted in Kaliganj upazila of Dhaka district. Study on micronutrient supplementation RED has conducted a research on the ‘Effect of multiple micronutrient beverage supple-mentation on adolescent schoolgirls in rural Bangladesh’ with financial support from Micronutrient Initiative. The results show that the micronutrient-fortified beverage sig-nificantly improved growth and haemo-globin, ferritin and vitamin A levels within six months of supplementation. Supple-mentation for more than 6 months did not show any significant added benefits. The effects were pronounced in girls who were anaemic at baseline. The beverage was found not only to prevent the natural prog-ression of anaemia in adolescent girls but

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also to cure anaemia and iron deficiency to a high degree. The supplement was found to have no significant effect on either school achievement or cognitive functions of anaemic or non-anaemic schoolgirls. Rather, a negative effect was seen on arithmetic part

of the school achievement and percentage of wrong score in visual search in non-anaemic girls supplemented for 12 months. The beverage is, therefore, recommended for supplementation for six months.

The rural mothers in Rangamati hill district are seen feeding their children food mixed with micronutrient sprinkles. EDUCATION Study on BRAC pre-primary learners BRAC initiated pre-primary education programme in 1997 for children aged below six years. On completion of one-year pre-primary course the learners enroll in formal primary schools. RED has conducted a study to compare the learning achievement of the formal school students who had BRAC’s pre-primary education with those who did not have such education. The findings show that learning achievement of grade I stu-dents of formal primary schools with BRAC

pre-primary education was significantly better than those who did not have such edu-cation. However, no such difference was observed in the test of grade II students. The teachers of formal schools, parents, and the community people praised the pre-primary initiative of BRAC. Study on competency achievement of BRAC school students A study on the competency achievement of BRAC school students at the end of grade V

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has been initiated. This is the fifth study of this kind. The earlier studies concentrated only on the NFPE schools. However, for the first time, two other types of schools viz., community school and BRAC primary schools are also added in the sample. Study on quality primary education A study on the quality primary education in Bangladesh commissioned by the ESTEEM project of the Directorate of Primary Educa-tion, GoB was done. The study looked at the process of various provisions in six good quality primary schools of the country – five government schools and one non-govern-ment registered school. Process documentation on EIC programme A process documentation on BRAC’s Edu-cation for Indigenous Children (EIC) was done and the findings were presented at a seminar recently. This study documented four different stages of the programme. These include staff foundation training, school inaugural workshop, school opening session, and material development. Education Watch 2003-04 Education Watch 2003-04 aims to conduct in-depth research on deprivation and negli-

gence in access and quality of primary education and to explore the measures of ensuring quality Education For All (EFA) in the country. The findings of Education Watch 2003-04 were shared with various stakeholders at a workshop held in Dhaka on 22 November 2004. The final report is expected soon. Study on successful school management As a member of the Asian Network of Training and Research Institutions in Edu-cation Planning (ANTRIEP) RED has con-ducted a study on successful school manage-ment at primary level. The findings were presented at a dissemination seminar on 19 September 2004, jointly organized by the National Academy for Educational Manage-ment (NAEM) and BRAC and also at the BAFED-UNESCO Researchers Conference in Dhaka. Mr Samir R Nath of RED and Dr Sudhir C Sarker of BRAC University Institute of Education participated in the ANTRIEP policy seminar on ‘Improving school management: learning from successful schools’ held in Manila, The Philippines during 6-8 July 2004. Mr Nath presented the findings of this study. Following the seminar the BRAC team participated in a meeting of the ANTRIEP member institutions held at the same venue.

Dr M Osman Farruk, Education Minister of the Government of Bangladesh is addressing as the chief guest in the dissemination seminar on 19 September 2004. Others in podium are (L-R) Dr Imran Matin, Director Research, BRAC, Professor Khalilur Rahman, Director General, NAEM, and Dr Manzoor Ahmed, Director, BRAC University Institute of Education.

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ENVIRONMENT Evaluation of BRAC nurseries An evaluation of BRAC nurseries was carried out to help design the programme based on ecological distribution of the plant species. The study aimed to find out local demand of the plant species for extension of the social forestry programme, to know the germination status of different species and the status of the environmental issues of the nursery programme, and to compare the performance of different nurseries operated by BRAC, BRAC’s village organizations, individual entrepreneurs, and the govern-ment. Study on the cultivation prospect of medicinal plants in Bangladesh A study was conducted to explore the possibility of cultivation of medicinal plants in Bangladesh as a sustainable livelihood option. The study also aimed to explore the demand and market for medicinal plants. The farmers are motivated to cultivate medicinal plants because of its profitability although its market is still in a pre-mature stage. The producers of herbal medicines and cosmetics are the major users of medi-cinal plants. Pilot research on improving in-house medical waste management RED has conducted a pilot study to develop an appropriate medical waste management system in hospitals and clinics. The study was conducted in two children hospitals and one BRAC health centre to create awareness among hospital staff, develop appropriate waste management guideline, and introduce environment-friendly, healthy, and economi-cally viable in-house waste management system. The hospital staff were trained on in-house management of medical waste. It

was found that the perception of occu-pational injury has been changed among them after receiving the training. A manual on in-house hospital waste management has been prepared. To finalize this manual, a workshop was held on 28 October 2004 in Dhaka. Major stakeholders on the issue of waste management, health, and environment attended the workshop. Pilot research on rural energy BRAC and Emergence Energy, Inc. of the USA have recently signed an agreement to conduct a pilot research on energy and environment called ‘Project Emergence.’ This project is a micro-enterprise effort involving five components: a) local pro-duction of environmentally sound energy; b) local consumption of electricity and other energy production by-products; c) empower-ment of the poor, particularly women; d) creation of sustainable jobs; and e) commu-nity development. The project plans to establish mini power plants (MPP) in rural Bangladesh, each of which will be owned and operated by two borrowers in a micro-credit programme. Using cow dung and Stirling engine the MPP will produce elec-tricity, fertilizer, and heat for drying. In addition to using biogas, the Stirling engine may also use alternative fuels even kero-sene. Assessment of rural piped water system RED has recently started a study on the assessment of rural piped water system in arsenic affected five upazilas. The study aims to explore the management mecha-nism, success and weakness of piped water system; know the satisfaction level of the users; and to explore the reasons of not using piped water.

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Village level public health provision and the role of local elite RED has been conducting a study on local elite’s involvement in providing public health provision like water and sanitation. The study also aims to explore the under-

lying causes behind such support to the villagers specially the poor. To look at those issues, elite perception of disease and disease transmission, their understanding about the relationship between health and poverty, and their thoughts about the role of local institutions will also be covered.

OTHER STUDIES/ACTIVITIES Study on SME Unit of BRAC Bank An assessment of BRAC Bank’s operations in terms of geographical poverty outreach and employment creation has been com-pleted. The findings reveal that 19% of the total portfolio is concentrated in poorer areas, 11% went to the poor districts with income poverty index (IPI) 45.1-50, and 7 % went to the districts with IPI above 50. The median number of employees (including owner) of sampled enterprises was five. Fifteen percent of the employees of the sampled enterprises were employed after getting loan from BRAC Bank. Twenty-nine percent of the enterprises reported hiring new employees after getting loan from BRAC Bank. Adolescent survey RED has recently initiated a study to generate a national database of the adoles-cents in Bangladesh to redesign the Adoles-cent Development Programme of BRAC. The study aims to explore the issues of marriage, dowry, education, daily time use, reproductive health, health-seeking beha-viour, drug use, and mobility perspective.

Both quantitative and qualitative methods will be used in data collection. Flood relief operation of BRAC in Dhaka city: a quick assessment RED conducted a day-long quick assess-ment of BRAC’s flood relief operation at 17 different urban area offices of BRAC in Dhaka city on 30 July 2004. Eleven two-person groups visited the area offices and relief operation sites of BRAC, and recorded their observations and findings. The objective of this assessment was to improve BRAC’s relief operations for the flood-affected persons. The findings include general observations; assessment of quality, quantity, frequency, adequacy and over-lapping of relief; relief plan and operations; operation-related vertical information flow within BRAC offices; communication with flood-affected people; staff motivation; and suggestions for improvement. The study was conducted on a weekly holiday and a brief report was produced on the following day. The findings were presented to the BRAC programme management on 01 August 2004 which helped improve the relief operation of BRAC.

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Hundreds of thousands of Chapatis were produced at BRAC field offices as well as its head office in Dhaka for distribution among the flood-affected people during July-August 2004.

BRAC medical team went to the flood-affected areas to provide medical assistance and distribute medicines.

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Ongoing Studies EDUCATION STUDIES 1. Assessing the needs of ethnic minority

students for learning improvement in secondary schools - MM Kabir and SR Nath

2. Competencies achievement of BRAC

school students - SR Nath, MM Shahjamal, RN Yasmin, T Zafar, and MM Kabir

3. Competencies achievement of NFPE

students after completing grade III - RN Yasmin, T Zafar, MM Shahjamal, and SR Nath

4. Education Watch 2005: state of

secondary education in Bangladesh - SR Nath, MM Shahjamal, and N Ahmad

5. Exit as a process: exploring BRAC

University student dropouts - Munshi Sulaiman

6. An exploration of the out of school

children in tea garden and ethnic minority areas - SR Nath, MM Shahjamal, and RN Yasmin

7. Rethinking education of the children in

poorest families: an exploration into the existing mechanism in rural Bangladesh - Md. Mahbubul Kabir

8. A study on the impact of ELA programme on the lives of the adolescents - RN Yasmin, R Karim, and I Matin

ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES 9. Arsenic mitigation: an epidemiological

study at Matlab - Md. Jakariya

10. Assessment of rural piped water supply

system in Bangladesh - Md. Quaiyum Sarkar, Md. Jakariya, and MM Rahman

11. Profile of ethnic minority: environment

component - Nasima Akter and Md. Salim

12. Project emergence (Rural electricity

generation from renewable sources): feasibility study - Nasima Akter, et al.

13. Village level public health provision

and the role of local elites - Lammia Sharmin and N Hossain

HEALTH, POPULATION, AND NUTRITION STUDIES 14. AIDS awareness campaign for the

CSWs and other high risk groups: mid-term survey 2005 - Syed Masud Ahmed and AKMM Rana

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15. BHEW survey - second phase - Abbas Bhuiya, M Chowdhury, S Mahmud, A Salam, SM Ahmed, and AKMM Rana

16. BRAC's health micro-insurance programme: a demand side analysis - Imran Matin, N Imam, and SM Ahmed

17. CFPR/TUP: improving the capacity of

‘unqualified’ providers for rational treatment of common illnesses (a pilot study) - Syed Masud Ahmed, AKMM Rana, and A Hossain

18. Community-based kangaroo mother

care to prevent neonate and infant mortality - Iftekhar Quasem, MA Khan, and S Islam

19. DOTS strategy for tuberculosis control:

socioeconomic and gender divide in accessing DOTS services in rural Bangladesh - Fazlul Karim, et al.

20. The effect of anthelminthic treatment on

helminth infection and anaemia among the female workers of the Ayesha Abed Foundation in Bangladesh - Marufa Aziz Khan and S Islam

21. The effectiveness of flexible administra-

tion of sprinkles in a mixed population of anaemic and non-anaemic infants and young children in rural Bangladesh - Farhana Haseen

22. Food consumption survey among the

ultra poor households - Farhana Haseen

23. Formative research on the development

of social marketing, distribution and communication strategy for sprinkles to

control iron deficiency anaemia among young children - Fazlul Karim and N Choudhury

24. Literature review on food safety in

Bangladesh - Ahmed Ali

25. National low birth weight prevalence

survey of Bangladesh 2003-2004 - Harun KM Yusuf, F Haseen, and I Quasem

26. National nutrition programme manage-

ment: study focusing on resources - Ahmed Ali

27. Operation research on child-to-child

approach for early childhood develop-ment: mid-term survey 2005 - Syed Masud Ahmed, AKMM Rana, and EK Aneire

28. Primary healthcare in later life (PHILL):

post-intervention survey - AKMM Rana, A Hossain, and SM Ahmed

SOCIOECONOMIC STUDIES 29. An approach towards communications

and change: how communications can build social capital for the ultra poor - Jenevieve Mannell and A Chowdhury

30. A baseline study of social capital of the

ultra poor - Mehnaz Rabbani, M Sulaiman, MSH

Siddiquee, and T Ali 31. Building social capital for the ultra

poor: challenges and achievements - Karishma Huda, S Rahman, and C Guirguis

32. Is social capital the missing link? an exploratory study of Gram Shahayak Committee effectiveness

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- Karishma Huda, S Rahman, and C Guirguis

33. Profile of small ethnic groups in

Bangladesh - Mohammad Rafi, et al.

34. Sector scan of TUP enterprises: sustain-ability and its determinants - Safeena Alarakhia and P Barua

35. Theft and poverty: everyday forms of

property crime - Tariq Ali 36. The wider social impacts of BRAC’s

group-based lending in rural Bangla-

desh: group dynamics and participation in public life

- Naila Kabeer and I Matin 37. Women ward members and their role in

VGD card selection: a qualitative exploration

- Imran Matin, M Rashid, AM Shihab, and M Noor

OTHER STUDIES 38. Authorship conflict and dilemma in

selected Bangladeshi research institutions: an exploratory study - Hasan Shareef Ahmed, A Hadi, and N Choudhury

Hospital waste segregation at three different coloured bins at the Institute of Child Health and Shishu Shasthya Foundation, Dhaka. RED has conducted a pilot research on improving in-house medical waste management in collaboration with three selected hospitals (Dhaka Shishu Hospital, Institute of Child Health and Shishu Shasthya Foundation, and one BRAC upgraded health centre).

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Capacity Development

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Capacity Development Overseas training Doctoral programme Syed Masud Ahmed, Research Coordinator is pursuing doctoral programme at the Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden. Ahmed Ali, Research Fellow is pursuing doctoral programme at the Wageningen University, The Netherlands. Md. Jakariya, Senior Research Associate is pursuing doctoral programme at the Royal Technical Institute, Stockholm, Sweden. Chowdhury SB Jalal, Research Associate is pursuing doctoral programme in nutrition at the Cornell University, USA. Debdulal Mallick, Research Associate is pursuing doctoral programme in economics at the Emory University, USA. AKM Masud Rana, Staff Researcher is pur-suing doctoral programme in geriatric epide-miology, at the Karolinska Institute, Sweden. Sabina F Rashid, Senior Research Associate is pursuing doctoral programme at the Australian National University, Australia. Masters programme Farhana Haseen, Research Associate is pursuing a masters course in the Department

of Maternal and Child Health, Uppsala University, Sweden. In-country training Nuzhat Choudhury, Research Associate attended a training course on software pro-gramme ‘Atlas-Ti’ for qualitative research organized by RED at BRAC University on 3-4 June 2004. Frahana Haseen, Staff Researcher attended a training course on ‘Statistical data analysis’ organized by RED at BRAC University during 9-18 March 2004. Marufa Aziz Khan, Research Associate attended a certificate course on ‘Epidemio-logy and biostatistics’ organized by ICDDR,B in Dhaka during 15 August-15 September 2004. Mizanur Rahman, Field Manager and Farid Ahmed, Field Supervisor attended a training course on ‘Food and nutrition security in Bangladesh’ organized by Bangladesh Rice Research Institute (BRRI) in collaboration with the Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University, Denmark held at BRRI, Gazipur during 18-27 February 2004. Md. Quaiyum Sarkar, Research Associate attended a training course on ‘Environment and environmental law’ organized by Bangladesh Environmental Lawyers Asso-ciation (BELA), in Dhaka during 25-30 September 2004.

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He also attended a three-week long training course on ‘Basic statistics with SPSS applications’ at the Independent Uni-versity Bangladesh, Dhaka during 12-30 December 2004. Workshop on qualitative research To strengthen the use of applying qualitative research as well as to build the capacity of qualitative researchers of RED a workshop

entitled “Thinking qualitatively: theory and practice of qualitative research” was held during 10-14 May 2004 at Rajendrapur. Organized by RED the workshop was attended by 24 participants – 19 researchers and five programme staff of BRAC. Dr Shahaduz Zaman, Senior Research Fellow of RED and Dr Diana Gibson of the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands facilitated the workshop.

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Support Extended to Others Hasan Shareef Ahmed, Chief of Editing and Publication, presented guest lecture on ‘Scientific misconduct and publication ethics’ at the Advance Course on Research Bioethics, organized by the Bangladesh Medical Research Council in Dhaka on 17 April 2004. He also presented guest lecture on ‘Authorship of scientific articles: criteria for authorship and ethical issues’ at Certificate Courses on Research Bioethics, organized by the Bangladesh Medical Research Council in Dhaka on 4 and 19 December 2004. AMR Chowdhury, Deputy Executive Director of BRAC (in-charge of RED contributed as a co-chair of the Priority Disease Working Group of Joint Learning Initiative (JLI) on Human Resources for Health. JLI is a network of global health leaders launched by the Rockefeller Foundation and supported by the Harvard University’s Global Equity Initiative. The Working Group aimed to analyze the current and future needs for human resources to fight select diseases, using supply and demand lens to explore new models for control within an integrated health system. JLI has published a report titled “Human resources for health: overcoming the crisis” which puts forward strategies for the community, country, and global levels in overcoming this crisis through cooperative action.

He also contributed as a joint coordinator of the UN Millennium Project’s Task Force on Child Health and Maternal Health. The UN Millennium Project is an independent advisory body commissioned by the UN Secretary General to propose the best strategies for meeting the Millennium Development Goals. The Task Force produced a report titled “Who’s got the power? Transforming health systems for women and children. M Showkat Gani, Research Associate has contributed in a training course on ‘Moni-toring and evaluation’ organized by BRAC Training Division for the senior officials of the Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Husbandry and the Ministry of Irrigation, Water Resources and Environment, Govern-ment of Afghanistan. They attended a five-month long certificate course on ‘Managing rural development’ at BRAC. Imran Matin, Director Research participated as a panel member of civil society represen-tatives in an international consultation on Millennium Development Goals held on 1-3 October in Siem Reap, Cambodia organized by the UNDP. Samir R Nath, Senior Research Fellow and M Showkat Gani, Research Associate facili-tated a training course for the researchers of BRAC Education Programme on ‘Introduc-tory statistics’ held at BRAC during 26-29 September 2004.

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Samir R Nath, Senior Research Fellow wrote a chapter for the Campaign for Popu-lar Education based on the profile of the NGOs providing education. This chapter is added as an overview in the Directory of NGOs with Education Programme, Bangla-desh 2004, published by CAMPE.

Interns at RED Fifteen interns, 14 of them from abroad, were placed at RED for internship during 2004. They were attached to different research projects and have gained extensive field level experience. Particulars of the interns are given below.

List of interns

Name Institution

Safeena Alarakhia Aga Khan Foundation Canada

Arvid Chowdhury Trinity College, University of Toronto, Canada

Annie Duflo John F Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University,USA

Ross Edgeworth

Department of Geography and Environmental Management, University of Northumbria, UK

Catherine Guirguis

Faculty of Environmental Studies, York University, Canada

Katie Harris Department of Geography, University of Manchester, UK

Hedy IP Department of Nutritional Sciences, University of Toronto, Canada

Qazi Shafayetul Islam

On individual capacity

Elisabetta (Lily) Lapenna School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, UK

Jenevieve Mannell

Aga Khan Foundation Canada

Keisuke Nakagawa Fulbright Scholar, Cornell University, USA

Tanya Palit Fulbright Scholar, International Institute of Education, USA

Sabeel Rahman Department of Social Studies, Harvard University, USA

Nadia Rahman

University of Delaware, USA

Laura Street

Oxford Policy Management, UK

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Some of the publications of RED

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Dissemination of Research

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RED Seminar in 2004

Date Topic Speaker(s)

Feb 05 Efficacy of daily and weekly home fortification of weaning food with sprinkles among infant and young children in Bangladesh

Farhana Haseen

27 BRAC pre-primary graduates in formal primary

schools: an assessment Hosne Ara Begum, Associate Professor, IER, DU Mirja M Shahjamal and Rosie Nilufar Yasmin, RED

Mar 25 A study on BRAC-Ain o Salish Kendra joint legal

aid programme Dilruba Banu

Apr 01 Arsenic in food chain: existing state of knowledge Imamul Haq

Dhaka University

New ways of arsenic mitigation: experiences of using ICT in Araihazar

MA Matin Dhaka University

Eviction of Kalyanpur slum: a close observation

Mamun-ur-Rashid

10 Marketing scenario and sustainability of vegetable enterprise of STUP in north Bengal (proposal)

Proloy Barua

Effectiveness of flexible administration of sprinkles in a mixed population of anaemia and non-anaemia infants and young children in rural Bangladesh

Farhana Haseen

25 Addressing the underlying causes of poverty and marginalization in Chittagong

Prashanta Tripura CARE-Bangladesh

Communal violence (Post-election violence) Mohammad Rafi

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Date Topic Speaker(s)

May 06 Chronic poverty and development David Hulme Director, Chronic Poverty Research Centre, University of Manchester, UK

24 Evaluation of BRAC nursery with special reference

to ecological distribution of plant species MA Quaiyum

30 An assessment of BRAC pre-primary graduates in

formal primary schools

Hosne Ara Begum Associate Professor IER, DU

31 Effect of micronutrient beverage supplement on growth, micronutrient status, educational perfor-mance and cognitive functions of adolescent school girls in rural Bangladesh

Marufa A Khan Shaheen Akter

Jun 01 Successful school management: case studies on

formal and non-formal primary schools Samir R Nath Mirja M Shahjamal

02 The influence of parents socioeconomic and cultural

behavior on their children’s education in Bangladesh

Md. Abu Bakar Siddique

07 Looking at ins and outs: a process documentation

research on education for indigenous children programme

Mahbubul Kabir Samir R Nath Shahduz Zaman

20 Community-led total sanitation in Bangladesh:

concept and experiences

Kamal Kar

22 Performance of ethnic minority children in

secondary education: an exploratory study on selected BRAC-PACE schools

Mahbuba Nasreen Associate Professor Department of Sociology, DU

Jul 14 National low birth weight prevalence survey of

Bangladesh, 2003-2004 Farhana Haseen

Aug 01 Marketing scenario and sustainability of vegetable

enterprise of specially targeted ultra poor (STUP) in north Bengal (findings)

Proloy Barua

08 Baseline survey of secondary schools in three

selected districts M Nazmul Haq

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Date Topic Speaker(s)

Aug 12 Food consumption survey among the ultra poor Farhana Haseen Sep 15 Cultivation prospect of medicinal plants in

Bangladesh: experiences from Natore Lammia Sharmin

29 The efficacy and effectiveness of the flexible

administration of iron through sprinkles to anaemic and non-anaemic children in rural Bangladesh

Hedy IP RED Intern

Oct 28 DOTS strategy for tuberculosis control: socioeconomic and gender divide in accessing BRAC DOTS services

Fazlul Karim

Dec 02 Role of tubewell masons to mitigate arsenic

poisoning in drinking water in rural areas of Bangladesh

Mizanur Rahman

06 Effect of anthelminthic treatment on helminth,

haemoglobin concentration and anaemia among the female workers of the Ayesha Abed Foundation in Bangladesh

Marufa Aziz Khan

Building future with fair trade: challenges of

accessing UK supermarkets Stephanie Barrientos IDS, Sussex, UK

15 Comparing TUP enterprises: determinants of sustainability

Safeena Alarakhia Proloy Barua

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Presentations in Conferences, Seminars and Workshops Syed Masud Ahmed, Research Coordinator presented a paper titled ‘Healthcare for the ultra poor: the case of a marginalized popu-lation from Bangladesh’ at the International Health Course in Gothenburg, Sweden on 12 March 2004. Nasima Akter, Research Fellow presented the following papers: - ‘A comparative analysis of medical waste

management situation in some selected countries’ at the International Conference on Environment and Development held during 4-8 February 2004 in Calcutta, India.

- ‘Environmental assessment of the poultry

sector of BRAC’s ultra poor programme’ at the International Symposium on Envi-ronmental Management on 7-8 January 2004 in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

- ‘Medical waste management: status and

prospect” at the 26th Annual Conference of Bangladesh Chemical Society on 23 January 2004 in Chittagong, Bangladesh.

- ‘Hospital waste, environment and health’

at the conference and workshop on Injec-tion Safety and Hospital Waste Disposal on 19-20 June 2004 in Dhaka, Bangla-desh.

- ‘BRAC’s experience on flood disaster risk management and reduction’ at the National Workshop on Options for Flood Risk and Damage Reduction in Bangla-desh on 7-9 September 2004 in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

- ‘Improving in-house medical waste

management: an experience from Bangla-desh’ at the Asian Civil Society Forum 2004 on 21-25 November 2004 in Bangkok, Thailand.

Farhana Haseen, Staff Researcher presented the results of a study entitled ‘Efficacy of daily and weekly fortification of weaning foods with sprinkles’ at the National Work-shop on Home Fortification of Weaning Food with Sprinkles: A New Strategy to Control Iron Deficiency Anaemia among Infants and Young Children on 11 February 2004 in Dhaka. SM Ziauddin Hyder, Senior Research Fellow gave following presentation: - ‘Acceptability of the sprinkles intervention

delivered through community health volunteers in rural Bangladesh at the 11th Canadian International Health Confer-ence, Ottawa, Canada on 24 May 2004.

- ‘Efficacy of daily and weekly sprinkles

supplementation among infants and young

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children’ at the International Nutritional Anaemia Consultative Group (INACG) meeting at Lima, Peru 2004 on 18 November 2004.

- ‘Efficacy of multiple micronutrient drink

on anaemia and iron status in school-going adolescent girls’ at the Experimen-tal Biology Meeting of FASEB in Washington DC, USA on 18 April 2004.

Imran Matin, Director Research presented the following papers: - ‘Delivering inclusive microfinance with a

poverty focus: experiences of BRAC’ at the Advanced Reflective Training of Up-scaling Microfinance organized by Tata-Dhan Foundation in Madurai, India on 3 December 2004.

- ‘Extreme poverty and social safety nets’ to

the trainees of the Salma Sobhan Fellow-ship for Development Journalism at Savar TARC on 19 December 2004.

- ‘Managing scaling up challenges of a

programme for the poorest: a case study of BRAC's IGVGD programme’ at the Global Conference on Scaling up of Poverty Alleviation held in Shanghai, China during 25-27 May 2004.

- ‘We are running the heart of the system:

understanding organizational culture in practice – a BRAC case study’ at a work-shop on Ethnography of NGOs, organized by the INTRAC-Development Studies Association, UK, held in Oxford, UK on 28-29 April 2004.

Nigar Nargis of Dhaka University, Mostofa Zaman of WHO and Iftekhar Quasem of RED, BRAC presented the findings of

‘Impact of tobacco-related illnesses on Bangladeshi economy’ in the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, GoB on 26 September 2004. Samir R Nath, Senior Research Fellow presented a paper on ‘Management of a successful primary school in Bangladesh’ in a policy seminar of the Asian Network of Training and Research Institutions in Educational Planning (ANTRIEP) held in Manila, The Philippines on 2-5 July 2004. Mirja M Shahjamal, Staff Researcher presented a paper on gender difference in mathematics at the UNESCO-BAFED Researchers Forum held in Dhaka on 18 December 2004. Rosie Nilufar Yasmin, Staff Researcher along with Hosne Ara Begum, Associate Professor, IER, Dhaka University presented a paper on assessment of pre-primary schools at the UNESCO-BAFED Resear-chers Forum held in Dhaka on 18 December 2004. Harun KM Yusuf, Consultant and Farhana Haseen, Staff Researcher presented the findings of the following studies: - ‘Anaemia prevalence survey of urban

Bangladesh and rural Chittagong Hill Tracts 2003’ before the Core Expert Group and Technical Committee of Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, GoB in Dhaka on 22 November 2004.

- ‘National low birth weight prevalence

survey of Bangladesh 2003-2004’ before the Core Expert Group of Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, GoB in Dhaka on 05 August 2004.

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Publications in 2004 A. INTERNAL PUBLICATIONS Annual report BRAC Research 2003. May 2004. vi, 79p. Research compendium Nirjash, issue 14, Aug 2004. 79p. [In Bangla] Working papers CFPR/TUP Research Team. Stories of targeting: process documentation of selecting the ultra poor for CFPR/TUP programme. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004. xii, 34p. (CFPR-TUP Working paper series no. 1) Hossain M and Matin I. Engaging elite support for the poorest? BRAC’s experience with the ultra poor programme. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004. vi, 17p. (CFPR-TUP Working paper series no. 3) Matin I and Halder SR. Combining methodo-logies for better targeting of the extreme poor: lessons from BRAC’s CFPR/TUP programme. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004. vi, 19p. (CFPR-TUP Working paper series no. 2) Matin I and Walker S. Exploring changes in the lives of the ultra poor: an exploratory study on CFPR/TUP members. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004. vi, 14p. (CFPR-TUP Working paper series no. 4) Zaman S, Rahman H, Edgeworth R. Health domain of the ultra poor: an exploration. Dhaka

and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004. vi, 45p. (CFPR-TUP Working paper series no. 5) Equity Watch paper Ahmed SM, Bhuiya A, Rana AKMM, Hadi A, Mahmud S, Salam A, Chowdhury M. Monitoring the status of health equity in Bangladesh: the BHEW survey 2002. Dhaka: Bangladesh Health Equity Watch, 2004. 30p. (Equity Watch paper no. 3) B. EXTERNAL PUBLICATIONS Original scientific papers (including short communications) Akter N, Sharmin L, Lapenna L. Environmental assessment of the poultry sector of CFPR/TUP programme: experience of BRAC’s ultra-poor poultry programme. Int J Environ Pollution 2004;22(5):608-27. Amin SMN and Akhter N. Medical waste management in Dhaka city, Bangladesh. The Pennsylvania Geographer 2004;42(2):130-41. Bacerra-Posada F, Berwick D, Bhutta Z, Chowdhury M, de Savigny D, Haines A, et al. Informed choices for attaining the millennium development goals: towards an international cooperative agenda for health-systems research. Lancet 2004;364:997-1003. Begum HA, Yasmin RN, Shahjamal MM. An assessment of BRAC pre-primary graduates in formal primary schools. Bangladesh Edu J 2004;3(2):9-18.

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Chen L, Evans T, Anand S, Boufford JI, Brown H, Chowdhury M, et al. Human resources for health: overcoming the crisis. Lancet 2004;364: 1984-90. Chowdhury AMR. Arsenic crisis in Bangladesh. Scientific American 2004;291(2):86-91. Chowdhury AMR and Bhuiya A. The wider impacts of BRAC poverty alleviation programme in Bangladesh. J Int Dev 2004;16(3):369-86. Hadi A and Parveen R. Arsenicosis in Bangladesh: prevalence and socioeconomic correlates Public Health 2004;118:559-64. Halder S and Mosley P. Working with the ultra poor: learning from BRAC experiences. J Int Dev 2004;16(3):387-406. Hyder SMZ, Persson LA, Chowdhury M, Lönnerdal B, Ekström EC. Anaemia and iron deficiency during pregnancy in rural Bangladesh. Public Health Nutr 2004;7(8):1065-70. Khatun M, Stenlund H, Hörnell A. BRAC initiative towards promoting gender and social equity in health: a longitudinal study of child growth in Matlab, Bangladesh. Public Health Nutr 2004;7(8):1071-9. Nath SR, Chowdhury AMR, Blinkhorn F. Child-ren's acquisition of health knowledge through compulsory primary schooling in Bangladesh. Int J Health Promotion Edu 2004;42(1):4–9. Nath SR and Shahjamal MM. Successful school management: case studies of two government primary schools. Bangladesh Edu J 2004;3(1): 41-54. Nilsson J, Parker MG, Kabir ZN. Assessing health-related quality of life among older people in rural Bangladesh. J Transcultural Nursing 2004;15(4):298-307. Zlotkin SH, Christofides AL, Hyder SMZ, Schauer CS, Tondeur MC, Sharieff W. Control-ling iron deficiency anemia through the use of home-fortified complementary foods. Indian J Pediatr 2004;71(11):1015-9. Zohir S and Matin I. Wider impacts of micro-finance institutions: issues and concepts. J Int Dev 2004;16(3):301-30.

Books and book chapters Ahmed SM. Health, nutrition and health-seeking behaviour. In: Towards a profile of the ultra poor in Bangladesh: findings from CFPR/TUP baseline survey. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004:61-76. Ahmed S and Nath SR. Public service delivery in education: the BRAC experience. In: Ahmed S and Bery S (Editors). Annual bank conference on development economics 2003 – south Asia component. New Delhi: National Council of Applied Economic Research, 2004:1-9. Akter N. BRAC’s experience on flood disaster risk management and reduction. In: National workshop on options for flood risk and damage reduction in Bangladesh: working papers. Dhaka: Government of Bangladesh, 2004. Akter N. A comparative analysis of medical waste management situation in some selected countries. In: Proceedings of the International Conference on Environment and Development, Calcutta: Institute of Social Studies, 2004. Akter N. Medical waste management: status and prospect. In: Proceedings of the 26th Annual Conference of Bangladesh Chemical Society. Chittagong: BCSIR, 2004. Akter N and Jakariya M. Water and sanitation status. In: Towards a profile of the ultra poor in Bangladesh: findings from CFPR/TUP baseline survey. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004:39-44. Hadi A. Health status. In: Towards a profile of the ultra poor in Bangladesh: findings from CFPR/TUP baseline survey. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004:45-60. Hadi A. Socio-demographic profile. In: Towards a profile of the ultra poor in Bangladesh: findings from CFPR/TUP baseline survey. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004:29-38. Halder SR. Employment and income. In: Towards a profile of the ultra poor in Bangla-desh: findings from CFPR/TUP baseline survey. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004:77-89.

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Halder SR. Food consumption pattern. In: Towards a profile of the ultra poor in Bangla-desh: findings from CFPR/TUP baseline survey. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004:91-104. Haseen F, Quasem I, Yusuf HKM. Food con-sumption, nutritional status, anaemia prevalence and worm infestation. In: Towards a profile of the ultra poor in Bangladesh: findings from CFPR/TUP baseline survey. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004: 153-81. Matin I. Financial market participation. In: Towards a profile of the ultra poor in Bangla-desh: findings from CFPR/TUP baseline survey. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004:105-14. Matin I, Hadi A, Ahmed SM. Introduction. In: Towards a profile of the ultra poor in Bangla-desh: findings from CFPR/TUP baseline survey. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004:1-25. Matin I and Yasmin R. Managing scaling up challenges of a programme for the poorest: case study of BRAC’s IGVGD program. In: Scaling up of poverty reduction: case studies in micro-finance. World Bank, 2004:77-93. Nath SR. An overview of the NGOs with educa-tion programme in Bangladesh. In: Directory of NGOs with education programme Bangladesh 2004. Dhaka: Campaign for Popular Education, 2004:3-11. Nath SR and Khan MKA. Schooling and literacy. In: Towards a profile of the ultra poor in Bangla-desh: findings from CFPR/TUP baseline survey. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004:133-49. Rafi M and Alim MA. Social status of ultra poor women. In: Towards a profile of the ultra poor in Bangladesh: findings from CFPR/TUP baseline survey. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004:115-32. School management: learning from successful schools in Bangladesh. Dhaka: National Academy for Educational Management and BRAC, 2004. 83p.

Towards a profile of the ultra poor in Bangla-desh: findings from CFPR/TUP baseline survey. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004. 200p. Editorials, letters and abstracts Akter N. A comparative analysis of medical waste management situation in some selected countries (abstract). In: International conference on environment and development: abstract. Kolkata: Institute of Social Studies, 2004. Akter N, Sharmin L, Lapenna L. Environmental assessment of the poultry sector of BRAC’s ultra poor programme (abstract). In: Rahman MM, et al. (eds). International symposium on environ-mental management: reprints and abstracts. Dhaka and Leicestershire: BUET and Loughborough University, 2004:17. Newsletter and newspaper articles Hussain AN, Matin I, Karim MR. Promoting road safety through community based interventions: highlights from a BRAC pilot. The Weekly Holiday 23 Apr 2004. Hyder SMZ and Zlotkin SH. Micronutrient sprinkles: a home fortification strategy for com-bating iron and other micronutrient deficiencies in infants and young children. Sight and life 2004;3:23-5. Karim F, Islam MA, Begum I, Chowdhury AMR, Ahmed F, Alam A, Matin I. Gender barriers to TB control in Bangladesh. The Daily Star, 25 Apr 2004. Matin I and Alam A. Doing more with micro-finance: a BRAC experience. The Daily Star, 23 Feb 2004. Nath SR. A brief introduction of NGOs con-ducting education programme (in Bangla). Shaksarata Bulletin 2004;125:3-9. Nath SR and Shahjamal MM. Management of a successful primary school in Bangladesh. ANTRIEP Newsletter 2004;9(1):11-14. Sattar MG. Para-professionals in development: a community trend-setter. The Weekly Holiday, 26 Mar 2004.

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_____________________________________________ * Listed according to the surname of the first author under thematic group.

Abstracts of Reports and Papers Completed in 2004* A. STUDIES ON POVERTY ALLEVIATION, EMPOWERMENT, AND

HUMAN WELL-BEING 01 Gender and good governance issues in local government of Bangladesh: a baseline report M Showkat Gani, M Ghulam Sattar The study mainly describes the pre-intervention situation of women leadership capacity in local government system of Bangladesh. Data came from the 16 upazilas of four districts in Khulna division, where the gender and good governance programme was in operation. The typical elected women UP member do not have much history of formal involvement in activities pertaining to the public domain. Thus, it is not sur-prising that they had weak participation in many public activities, such as, infrastruc-tural development, relief and rehabilitation activities, women and child development, communication and linkage with others. On the other hand, they were very active in setting up hygienic toilet, plantation, arsenic awareness creation, attendance of the social justice, and finally the relationship with elites. However, the weakest involvement of women UP members has been in formal committees through which resources are

allocated and decisions are made. The observed significant positive association of involvement in developmental activities of women UP members with their age and economic condition indicates that there may have been inadequate opportunity for young women with poorer background to parti-cipate and influence developmental work. 02 Engaging elite support for the poorest? BRAC’s experience with the ultra poor programme Naomi Hossain and Imran Matin (CFPR/TUP working paper no. 3) This paper describes and draws lessons from the experience of engaging village elite in support of the ultra poor through the Gram Shahayak Committees (GSC), as part of BRAC’s CFPR/TUP programme. The paper addresses the following questions: under what conditions can elite become engaged in support of interventions for the ultra poor? What are the risks and benefits of engaging elite in antipoverty programmes? After des- cribing the origins and motivations behind BRAC’s Specially Targeted Ultra Poor (TUP) programme, the paper goes on to explain how an important lesson from the programme as it evolved included the need

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for on-site, village-based protection and support for TUP participants and their newly-acquired assets. The paper goes on to explore some of the early impacts of the GSCs which were formed to fill this need, and to assess the motivations and factors underlying their effectiveness and success. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of the lessons from the experience, including their implications for assumptions that do-minate scholarship and programmes relating to the rural politics of poverty in Bangla-desh. 03 Combining methodologies for better targeting of the extreme poor: lessons from BRAC’s CFPR/TUP programme Imran Matin and Shantana R Halder (CFPR/TUP working paper no. 2) This paper aims to assess the effectiveness and draw lessons from the targeting strategy used in a new BRAC programme called Challenging the Frontiers of Poverty Reduc-tion-Targeting the Ultra Poor (CFPR/TUP) that aims to experiment with a different type of approach to address extreme rural poverty. The underlying theme of both the CFPR/TUP programme and the targeting methodology used is an acknowledgement of the strength of combining different methods and approaches for greater effect-tiveness. The programme, for instance, combines promotion and protection oriented mechanisms. Similarly, the targeting approach used in the programme combines various targeting methodologies and knowl-edge streams about the extreme poor. This paper uses programme data emerging out of its targeting exercise to assess questions of effectiveness of the approach used. Com-bining the various targeting approaches and drawing from different streams of knowl-edge has been the main innovativeness of the targeting methodology used in this

programme. The large differences we found between the two closely ranked groups of the poor – the extreme poor and those just above, also suggest that there is a structural break, rather than a continuum in terms of deprivation of opportunities, security and empowerment that is differentiating the extreme poor from others. It is through a better understanding of the various dimen-sions, dynamics and inter-linkages of these structural breaks that we can design the most effective strategies and programmatic approaches for this group of the poor. 04 Delivering inclusive microfinance with a poverty focus: experiences from BRAC Imran Matin Reading discourses right is important. The discourse around microfinance has been and is being shaped by interplay of ideas and forces, and it is important that we under-stand these dynamics and their implications for a poverty and social performance-centric microfinance future. This paper is a case study on how microfinance institutions can deliver on inclusive microfinance with a focus on poverty alleviation. It is based on how BRAC has managed to serve various market segments – the poorest, the poor and the non-poor – with microfinance, but always having at the core a poverty focused argument, thinking, strategizing and moni-toring. There have been challenges and things have not always gone as expected. The important point, however, is that these challenges and unanticipated consequences are identified and very much made to be a part of the ‘organizational discomfort’ that provides the fodder, language, and argu-ments for new innovations. This paper mainly elaborates how such challenges and fissures are made to count within an orga-nizational culture.

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05 Exploring changes in the lives of the ultra poor: an exploratory study on CFPR/TUP members Imran Matin and Sarah Walker (CFPR/TUP working paper no. 4) This paper is based on an exploratory study that aimed to better understand the percep-tions of change as defined by the pro-gramme members and the underlying factors that explain the changes perceived. The main finding is that initial conditions matter – households that owned homestead land, had other sources of income, had adult male labour power and did not suffer from recurrent health costs did better. The programme encouraged the members to save out of the income accrued from running the TUP enterprise, but the product was focused on supporting the promotional needs rather than protectional needs. The circumstances of the ultra poor households differ and a sole focus on the savings for meeting the promo-tional needs may thus need reconsideration. 06 Gram Shahayak Committees: a profile study Imran Matin This research aimed to develop a preliminary profile of the members of the Gram Shahayak Committees (GSC) formed of the village elites to work along with BRAC to help the ultra poor in their communities. On average, since formation each GSCs mobilized over Tk. 4,000 in cash and over Tk. 2,000 in kind from various sources. More than 3 TUP members were supported for medical treatment from each GSC. The GSC members were educated - 89% had at least one member having SSC or higher level of education. The GSCs have drawn its membership predominantly from agriculture-based occupation and high-end non-farm professional occupations, such as business and salaried jobs. The GSCs are

formed with people having dense social networks. Over half of the GSCs had mem-bers having experiences of Union Parishad responsibilities. The total number of TUP members being served by the GSC was an important positive determinant of total resources mobilized, suggesting a density effect. The GSCs who are more successful in mobilizing cash resources are also more successful in mobilizing resources in-kind. Having Palli Samaj and TUP members in GSCs positively affects mobilization of resources and taking actions to help the poor people beyond the TUP programme. 07 Struggling TUP members: lessons from case studies Imran Matin, Marufia Noor and Abu M Shihab A variation in the extent of gains that TUP members have been able to achieve since joining the CFPR/TUP programme is only natural. Learning from stories of cases where things did not go as planned can be very instructive to get a more compre-hensive understanding of the complexities of circumstances, interrelationships of cons-traints, unanticipated consequences, and programmatic gaps which can help us improve. Interestingly, the observable char-acteristics that we expected to be strongly associated with ‘struggling’ cases, such as age of the member, whether she had a husband or not, or certain types of enter-prises, etc. were not important as charac-teristics that distinguished between the ‘struggling’ cases and those that were not. The interesting variable in this respect is the ‘quality’ of husband’s labour proxied by asking the TUP member whether her hus-band was hard working or not. This variable essentially captures the husband’s willing-ness to work hard to improve household’s situation and could also partially reflect the overall quality of husband-wife relationship within the household. We found that this variable is an important one in terms of

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differentiating between the ‘struggling’ and ‘non struggling’ cases. It is interesting to note that of those who were ranked as ‘struggling’ and had husbands in the raking exercises, 83% reported that their husbands were physically able to work – yet only 58% of them reported that their husbands were able to work hard. 08 The very poor who participate in microfinance institutions and those who never did: a comparative analysis Imran Matin Despite the general consensus that the very poor have not been adequately reached by existing microfinance institutions, very little focused research exists on the financial market participation of the very poor in general and their microfinance institutions (MFI) participation, in particular. In this paper, we shed some light on these issues by comparing the very poor who manage to participate in microfinance institutions and those who never did, by making use of a unique dataset that emerged out of the baseline study of a new BRAC programme targeted at the very poor. We found that the poorest who participate in MFIs are relatively better-off than those who never participated, the causal relationship is not clear. In that sense, the targeting exclusion condition used by BRAC to exclude the poorest who were members of MFIs seems to be appropriate. However, we also found that the poorest who participated in MFIs also borrowed more from informal sources suggesting that a complementary, rather than a substitution relationship exists be-tween the two sources of finance. Moreover, the intensity of micro-credit taking is lower and tendency to dropout from one and not rejoin other MFIs is higher among the very poor who participate in MFIs compared to MFI participants coming from other poverty groups. Given that reaching the very poor

remains to be an important challenge that the global microfinance industry intends to address, a better understanding of the overall financial market participation of the very poor and exploring the differences between the very poor who manage to participate in microfinance programmes and those who do not can be important for guiding policy and practice. 09 Stories of targeting: process documenta-tion of selecting the ultra poor for CFPR/TUP programme Process documentation: Marufia Noor, Mamun-ur-Rashid, Abu Muhammad Shihab, and Rezvina Parveen. Consolidation: Hasanur Rahman and Tariq Ali. Training and supervision: Shahaduz Zaman and Imran Matin (CFPR/TUP working paper no. 1) The targeting process for the CFPR/TUP programme brings together diverse strands of knowledge on poverty (indigenous, local, programmatic, and academic) in identifying and selecting beneficiaries. The targeting process is, therefore, multi-staged and involves a variety of actors and processes. The targeting process has four stages. Through each stage, diverse streams of knowledge have been combined to identify a smaller and more defined sample from which the ultra poor beneficiaries are selected. The four targeting stages are rapport building, participatory rapid apprai-sal (PRA) meeting, survey and preliminary selection, and final selection. The process documentation revealed the wealth and diversity of activities and interactions that generally constitute the various stages of the targeting process. We explored the trends and patterns in each of these stages sepa-rately, before commenting on the broader themes that have emerged from the process documentation.

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10 Gender and good governance issues in local government of Bangladesh: a baseline report of extension phase M Shahadat Hossain Siddiqee The focal objective of BRAC social devel-opment programme is to strengthen women’s socio-political assets through pro-moting awareness of social, political and economic issues. The survey aimed to obtain the baseline profile of the women members of Union Parishad (UP) in the areas where the RETA pilot was implemented. In addition to some basic socio-demographic variables, data on knowledge of respon-

sibilities and duties, participation, and involvement in socioeconomic development activities of the women UP members were also collected. Findings reveal that many of them lack knowledge and information about the overall functions, duties and responsibi-lities of the UPs. Most members, who had knowledge of responsibilities and duties and prior experience in social welfare activities, had a lower level (below primary) edu-cation. Regression analysis suggests that prior involvement in social activities and knowledge of responsibilities and duties enhance the level of participation of the women UP members.

B. STUDIES ON HEALTH AND POPULATION 11 BRAC HIV/AIDS programme: baseline survey 2003 Syed Masud Ahmed and HE Nasreen This baseline survey was conducted in January-February 2003, in preparation for the programme recently started in Jamalpur and Faridpur. Three area offices of BRAC were randomly selected from each of the two districts. Purposive sampling was used to gather respondents from three groups: high-risk groups (commercial sex workers or CSWs, bus/truck drivers, and construc-tion workers), students, and community members. Bivariate and multivariate ana-lyses were done. The awareness about AIDS was regressed on several selected SES variables using logistic regression. AIDS awareness was found to be high overall, but the community members have much lower awareness levels (60%) than other groups (80-90%). Students and CSWs had high rates of HIV/AIDS knowledge regarding its transmission and prevention. Community people, bus/truck drivers, and construction workers had the lowest level of HIV/AIDS knowledge. The majority of the ‘AIDS aware’ population knew that unsafe sex was

the principle route of transmission. Knowl-edge about how HIV/AIDS is not trans-mitted was lower among all groups sur-veyed, and many had substantial misconcep-tions. Approximately one-third of the community people, bus/truck drivers, and construction workers had no knowledge of how to prevent AIDS. There are many predictors of HIV/AIDS knowledge, the most important being literacy, affluence, gender, religion, and location. The influence of literacy on HIV/AIDS awareness high-lights the importance of non-literate sources of information. The impact of gender on awareness points to the marginal position of women. The survey also showed that the level of knowledge varies by location, meaning different places need different pro-gramme intensity. 12 Customized development interventions for the ultra poor: does it make any difference in their health and health-seeking behaviour? Syed Masud Ahmed and AKMM Rana A mid-term survey of the CFPR/TUP pro-gramme (at the end of 1st cycle of 18 months

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intervention) on health and related issues was done during July-September 2004. The survey involved re-interviewing the same baseline survey households for studying the effects of intervention over time. Findings revealed substantial improvement in self-rated food security status and perceived self-health among programme participants which was matched by improved household capacity for health-expenditure and food consumption (and also reducing the proportion of carbohydrate in the diet). However, only marginal improve-ment was observed in children’s nutritional status and no improvement in women’s nutritional status. Contraceptive use increased substantially but not immunization coverage among children (11-23 months). Morbidity profile varied little during the two surveys. Increased health-seeking for illnesses occurred during the study period, with persistence of gender inequity in health-seeking from qualified providers. Emergence of the ‘para-professionals’ was encouraging while drug retailers continued to be one of the major player in healthcare provision for the poor. Potential ‘health empowerment’ effect of development inter-ventions was noted (e.g., increase in knowl-edge about locally available healthcare, increase in treatment-seeking from formal providers, etc.). 13 PHILL: baseline survey report 2003 (Bangladesh) Syed Masud Ahmed, AKMM Rana and ZN Kabir The baseline survey of the Primary Healthcare in Later Life (PHILL) project in Bangladesh was carried out in 2003 before the inception of the intervention. Four villages (within 3 km of a government and a NGO health centre), each for intervention and control areas, were randomly selected from Chandpur Sadar and Shahrasti upazilas respectively. The survey covered 488 households from the four villages of the

intervention area, which includes 514 elderly people and 478 households from the 4 villages of the comparison area, which includes 517 elderly people. A total of 915 primary caregivers and 130 health care providers were interviewed. The elderly people themselves selected primary care-givers, and healthcare providers were selected based on the information from the village people of the study area (where they go for treatment when get sick). Findings reveal that 72% of older people suffered from different types of chronic illness and 75% from arthritis and prevalence of acute illness was about 60%. Health-seeking behaviour shows that substantial numbers of older people do not seek treatment during illness and self-care is largely prevalent for managing illnesses. It also shows that during illness older people seek allopathic treat-ment, mostly from the local healthcare providers. Findings from the quality of life show that among the six dimensions, older people are satisfied with respect to spiritual and social dimensions while they are not satisfied in physical, economic, mental and environmental dimensions. 14 PHILL: a qualitative exploration (Bangladesh) Priti Biswas and Awlad Hossain The qualitative baseline exploration aimed to enhance understanding of the local context and realities to develop more appropriate primary healthcare intervention packages for improving elderly health and quality of life in rural areas. A cognitive and experiential approach was used to collect data in four villages under Chandpur Sadar upazila in Chandpur district. Data were collected from elderly people, main care-givers and health service providers through in-depth interview and focus group discussion during February-November 2003. Data were analyzed using textual analysis techniques. The study revealed four key elements of elderly health – reduced phy-

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sical ability and strength, food availability, increased vulnerability to sudden and certain illnesses, and mental happiness. Having good health, both physical and mental, is a central determinant of quality of life of older people. Elderly people use a range of healthcare services at one time or the other. For health problems like fever, loss of appetite, arthritis, gastric they generally use home remedies and do not seek any outside healthcare services at first. The elderly themselves are the key source of knowledge about home remedies. For other health problems they seek out medicine seller and village doctor close to them. They go to government and private hospitals for specialized treatment and pathological tests. In case of severe health problems, they seek services from nearby district and capital city. The elderly people do not seek any formal healthcare until the illness is severe. In addition, women seek informal healthcare more frequently than men. Decision about seeking healthcare for elderly can be made by elderly themselves, family members, relatives and neighbours. Commonly male elderly who have greater mobility may decide on his own healthcare while women almost rely on a male member of the family. It is common that the key male member of the family make decision about elderly treatment. Financial and cultural attitudes towards elderly health are the two main constraints for seeking healthcare. It is believed that illness and sufferings at old age are inevitable and medicine does not work with old people. 15 Early childhood development – child-to-child approach: baseline survey 2003 Hashima-E-Nasreen and SM Ahmed This baseline survey aims to investigate and understand the knowledge on and existing practices of child rearing among a represen-tative sample of rural adolescents to develop an effective intervention using the child-to-

child approach in the early childhood development (ECD) programme. The study was carried out in Sherpur, Bogra. Unmarried adolescents aged 12-19 years, with at least one under-five child in the household were included in this study. From each of the two intervention areas, 850 adolescents were selected while 500 adolescents were taken from the control area. Thus, the total sample consisted of 2,200 adolescents. A number of qualitative studies involving 5 boys and 6 girls were also carried out. This technique involved informal discussion with community people to find out appropriate persons to interview. Findings reveal that the majority of adolescents possess some general level of awareness about ECD and also some superficial knowledge on the importance of adequate nutrition, birth weight of children, immunization, close supervision for pre-venting accidents, etc. In practice, they spend time with children by playing, singing rhymes, storytelling, etc. Few use verbal and physical abuse to discipline them. They reported several activities for stimulating children’s mental development, such as talking frequently to the child, encouraging the child to study, make the child curious to different matters, etc. Some variation was noted among the study areas with respect to the level of awareness, knowledge and practice. Overall, adolescents from treat-ment areas possessed better knowledge and practice compared to the control area. 16 Health domain of the ultra poor: an exploration Shahaduz Zaman, Hasanur Rahman, Ross Edgeworth (CFPR/TUP working paper no. 5) There has been an increasing amount of materials surrounding health-seeking beha-viour in recent years. However, a relatively small proportion of literature has focused upon health behaviours and types of health

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services used by the poor in rural Bangla-desh, particularly ultra poor households. This study aimed to explore the health domain of the ultra poor, including percep-tions of ill health, knowledge and treatment-seeking behaviours in conjunction with the rationale behind these decisions. Data were collected through qualitative methods from the TUP members and their husbands or eldest sons in three villages within Nilpha-mari district. Findings indicate the regres-sive nature of burdens associated with ill health carry a number of similar impacts upon TUP members compared to other poor households in Bangladesh and the devel-oping world. Within this concept the ultra

poor’s experience of ill health is com-pounded by financial and time constraints, lack of health education and awareness of treatment facilities for particular diseases, and cultural rationality in selection of health care providers. Furthermore, a strong preval-ence for self care methods was recorded for the majority of illness episodes along with traditional healers such as Kabiraj. Conse-quently further research should explore integrating these health providers into BRAC interventions within the CFPR/TUP programme in order to strengthen the exist-ing medical system, ensuring the burden of ill health is minimized for the ultra poor.

C. STUDIES ON AGRICULTURE, FOOD AND NUTRITION 17 Anaemia prevalence survey of urban Bangladesh and rural Chittagong Hill Tracts - 2003 Farhana Haseen, I Quasem, SMZ Hyder and HKM Yusuf A cross sectional study to estimate the prevalence of anaemia in under-5 children, adolescents, pregnant, lactating and non-pregnant, and non-lactating women in urban Bangladesh and the Chitagong Hill Tracts (CHT). One drop of blood was collected by finger prick and the haemoglobin concen-tration was determined with a HemoCue photometer. Anaemia was indicated in accordance with cut-off values developed by WHO. A total of 45 clusters were randomly selected from the urban slum, urban non-slum and rural CHT. The total study sample size was 6,849. The study shows that pre-valence of anaemia in all study locations of urban Bangladesh was highest in under-5 children (60%) with the youngest group of 6-11 months having prevalence of 86%. The prevalence of anaemia in pregnant women was 42%, lactating mother 39%, NPNL 33%, adolescent girls 31% and adolescent boys 18%. Anaemia was always somewhat

more prevalent in slum than non-slum areas. In CHT, the prevalence of anaemia was also highest among children under-5 (62%), with infants (6-11 months) having prevalence to the tune of 90%. The prevalence of anaemia in adolescent boys was 40%, adolescent girls was found as 46%, pregnant women as 49%, lactating mothers as 43%, NPNL as 35%. Young children need attention. Further analysis to see the association with anaemia will be done. 18 Targeting the ultra poor: A baseline survey on food consumption pattern and anaemia and intestinal parasites infestation Farhana Haseen, I Quasem and HKM Yusuf It was a cross sectional study to assess the food intake of the ultra poor family among the under-5 children and women of repro-ductive age. The prevalence of anaemia and prevalence of intestinal worms were also observed. Twenty-four hours food intake recall method was used to collect data on the consumption of food and nutrient. A total of 200 households were randomly selected from Netrokona, Kishorgonj, Madaripur and

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Gopalgonj districts. The study showed that the average intake of total food for all ages and both sexes was 593.7 gm per person per day. In the cereal group, per capita per day intake was 438.0 gm. The average per capita food intake in under-5 children was 165.5 gm per day and 522.0 gm per day in women. Average calorie intake was 1731.1 kcal per person per day. Protein, fat, calcium and iron intake was 46.6 gm, 7.4 gm, 165.4 gm and 21.2 gm, respectively. Total calorie and protein intake in under-5 children was 513.1 kcal and 12.2 gm and in women was 1607.6 kcal and 33.0 gm, respectively. Mean hae-moglobin concentration of women of 15 to 45 years was 119±16. Overall, 47% of the women were anaemic and 9% of the women were moderately anaemic. Among the children under 5 years of age, mean heamo-globin was 104±16. On the whole 62% of the children were anaemic and 34% were moderately anaemic. Nearly two-thirds (66%) of women and half of the under-5 children had high loads of parasites. This high parasitic infestation is one reason for the high prevalence of anaemia among TUP population. 19 Effect of micronutrient beverage supplement on growth, micronutrient status, educational performance and cognitive functions of adolescent schoolgirls in rural Bangladesh Marufa Aziz Khan, F Haseen, CSB Jalal, M Rahman, S Akter, SN Huda, HKM Yusuf and SMZ Hyder The study aimed to determine the efficacy of a micronutrient beverage supplement on growth, iron and other micronutrient status, educational performance, and cognitive function. This double blind placebo-controlled randomized trial was conducted in 54 kishor-kishori schools in 5 upazilas in Sherpur district. A total of 1,125 girls aged 9-16 years were randomly assigned into two groups, micronutrient (n=559) and placebo

(n=556). They received either treatment 6 days a week for 12 months. Anthropometry, biochemical and cognitive function tests were done at baseline, 6th and 12th months. School achievement tests were done at base-line and at 12th month. Socioeconomic and demographic history was taken at baseline. The compliance to interventions was similar between the micronutrient and placebo groups (254.3±54.0 day vs. 258.1±43.0 day; p=0.19). Weight gain in the micronutrient group was significantly higher than in the placebo group at 6th and 12th months (both periods; p<0.001). Height gain was signi-ficant (p=0.06) compared to the placebo group at 12th month. The increases in BMI and MUAC also were significantly higher in the micronutrient group compared to the placebo group for both periods. Mean Hb concentration increased significantly (3.3 g/L; p<0.001) at 6th month in the micro-nutrient group and then remained almost unchanged till 12th month. In the placebo group, Hb concentration decreased by 0.9 g/L by the first 6 months and remained almost at that level at 12th month. Signi-ficant increment was also observed for serum ferritin in the micronutrient group. The percentage of positive 'C-reactive protein (>10 mg/L)' was significantly less (p<0.05) in the micronutrient group at 6th month indicating fewer infections. Serum zinc level increased significantly at 6th month and decreased significantly at 12th month in both the groups, but during the first 6 months, the increase in the micro-nutrient group was more compared to that in the placebo group and the difference was significant (p=0.08). Serum retinol at 6th month was significantly higher for the micronutrient group compared to the pla-cebo group (p<0.001). School achievement tests were administered among the girls of 35 schools (n=697) and no significant treatment effect between the groups was observed. Although there was no significant treatment effect in the anaemic girls, the micronutrient group tended to do better than

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placebo in school achievement tests and also in most of the cognitive function tests during first 6 months. On the other hand, at 12th month, a significant negative effect of treat-ment was found for supplemented non-anaemic group in arithmetic (p=0.03) as well as visual search (p=0.03) tests and they tended to perform poorer compared to the

respective placebo girls in other cognitive function tests. The multiple micronutrient-fortified beverages were found to be effec-tive in improving haemoglobin, ferritin, zinc, vitamin A and anthropometric status of adolescent girls within 6 months of supple-mentation. Supplementation for a longer period resulted in no greater benefits.

D. STUDIES ON EDUCATION 20 Quality with equity: the primary education agenda Manzoor Ahmed, Samir R Nath, Altaf Hossain, Md Mahbubul Kabir, Md Abul Kalam, Mirja M Shahjamal, Rosie Nilufar Yasmin, and Tata Zafar This study aimed to answer the following three questions. i) Why is a large portion of the children deprived of quality primary education? ii) Why don’t the schools function better? iii) What can be done to ensure quality primary education for all children? It probes into inter-connected factors bearing on performance of schools and children in 10 upazilas in the country. A micro (children, teachers, parents and the school) and meso (role of the upazila education authority and local administra-tion) perspective, complementing a macro and national view is provided in this study. A seven point action agenda has been provided for achieving primary education goals of the country. 21 An assessment of BRAC pre-primary graduates in formal primary schools Hosne Ara Begum, Rosie Nilufar Yasmin and Mirja M Shahjamal This study explored whether BRAC pre-primary (PP) has any influence on pupil’s learning when they are in formal primary schools after the intervention period is over. The performances of PP children were

compared with that of non-PP children of grades II and I in the formal schools. Views of several stakeholders like head teachers, class teachers, and SMC members were analyzed to find out the significance and consequence of BRAC pre-primary edu-cation. The findings revealed that in grade I PP oriented children performed significantly better than non-PP (NPP) children in terms of academic results, classroom and other school behaviours. In contrast, no significant difference was observed between these two groups in grade II. Majority of the stake-holders believe that all children require PP nurturing before starting formal education as it helps smooth transition from home to school and the institutional atmosphere of PP education helps children become passive to active learners. 22 Looking at ins and outs: a process documentation research on Education for Indigenous Children programme Md. Mahbubul Kabir, Samir R Nath and Shahaduz Zaman It is a process documentation study on BRAC’s Education for Indigenous Children (EIC) programme. BRAC’s EIC programme was designed with a view to ensuring the general provision of education for indige-nous children. Since onset in 2002, it has been receiving enthusiasm from many stakeholders and non-stakeholders. When a planned extension of this programme was undertaken, a process documentation

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research (PDR), a unique way of monitoring and assessing development work, seemed very useful. In this study, the different stages up to school opening process had been documented. Following were the stages considered for the study: 1) staff foundation training, 2) school inaugural workshop, 3) school opening session, and 4) material development. Though there are many pros and cons, we found EIC programme striving to make an indigenous child friendly schooling system. Targeted community people seemed cooperative and optimistic. To ensure a compressive inclu-sion of the indigenous children in primary education and to give a breakthrough in overall development of indigenous people, EIC programme requires many pragmatic supports from different stakeholders. PDR team, as a close stakeholder, was committed to give knowledge support through docu-mentation. PDR findings would be justified if it could make some contributions on the planning and successful implementation of the programme. 23 Case studies of quality primary education in Bangladesh Samir R Nath, Amina Mahbub, Mirja M Shahjamal, Md Mahbubul Kabir and Tata Zafar How do some primary schools in Bangla-desh succeed despite of well documented constrains they face? This study defines quality of education in a broader sense, which includes strong community participa-tion in school improvement, leadership quality of the school heads, teachers’ active participation in mentoring the learners, healthy teaching learning atmosphere in the classrooms, putting students in the centre of educational setting, and learning achieve-ment of the students. Six case studies have prepared on purposively selected six suc-cessful primary schools in Bangladesh – five of these schools are government and one is

registered non-government. Six researchers spent more than two months in each school and collected data through ethnographic and qualitative research techniques. Findings include constrains and weaknesses of the schools, and factors behind their success. Some recommendations are made. 24 Competencies achievement of BRAC NFPE students improving Samir R Nath and Mirja M Shahjamal Competency achievement of the students of BRAC non-formal primary schools at the end of their primary cycle was assessed. Four cohorts of students were considered and brought under assessment at the end of respective academic cycle. They are the students of second, third, fourth and fifth batches completing the courses between 2000 and 2003. The findings reveal that overall performance of the NFPE graduates increased over time. The graduates of the recent years are getting more homogeneous than the previous years and inter-school variation significantly reduced over the period. Gender difference in achievement also decreased recently. A collective effort of the teachers, programme organizers and the management was urged to keep this trend on. 25 Management of successful primary schools Samir R Nath and Mirja M Shahjamal This study aims to explore the management of successful primary schools in Bangla-desh. Two types of primary schools were considered – government and non-formal. Only the BRAC non-formal schools were considered. Four case studies on four schools, two from each type, were prepared. The schools were selected purposively from among the successful schools identified by the upazila education officers and the

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regional managers of BRAC Education Programme. It was evident that the schools had their own way of being successful, where the head teachers in the government schools and the programme organizers (PO) in BRAC schools had a significant role. The SMC, the community and parents had active participation in school matters. Head teachers/POs personality, honesty and devo-tion to education were also important. They knew how to make others active and capable. The annual plan, regularity of staff and SMC meetings, and teachers’ account-ability to SMC were found as significant features of the government schools. Class-room performance of the teachers was excellent. The government schools received

extra favour from the upazilas, besides they had their own income sources. No such favour or extra income was present in BRAC schools. The government schools enjoyed certain autonomy in financial matters and temporary staff recruitment. Significant attention to the scholarship examinees improved government schools’ reputation, but deprived the majority of the learners of interaction with the good teachers. Slow and first generation learners could not be well cared due to bigger class size and the short duration of periods. Such difficulty was less in BRAC schools due to small class size. Some policy recommend-ations are made.

E. STUDIES ON ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES 26 BRAC’s experience on flood disaster management Nasima Akter Like any other disaster, flood disrupts the normal life patterns and individuals, families as well as the nation are exposed to great material and personal losses. Flood occurs in Bangladesh more or less every year. It shatters the economic backbone of the wage-labourers and sharecroppers, as many become practically unemployed for certain period of time. BRAC works with the poor section of the society who suffers more than any other group. The countrywide network of BRAC also suffered heavily from the recent devastating flood of 2004. BRAC’s goal of poverty alleviation among its targeted rural households suffered a severe setback. BRAC has a long experience in natural disaster management for the victims especially the poor people living in rural and urban slum areas of Bangladesh. Starting with relief work gradually BRAC has learnt how to extend assistance for the victims of other natural calamities. Being the largest NGO working for improving the socio-

economic condition of the poor in Bangla-desh, BRAC is obliged to take a pro-active and effective role in the relief and post-flood rehabilitation activities so that damages can be minimized and people are prevented from sliding into the poverty trap. Based on BRAC experience in disaster management few recommendations are made to reduce the risk of flood disaster in Bangladesh. 27 Environmental assessment of the poultry sector of CFPR/TUP programme: experience of BRAC’s ultrapoor poultry programme Nasima Akter, L Sharmin and L Lapenna An environmental assessment of the poultry sector of BRAC’s CFPR/TUP programme has been conducted. Special focus was given to health and environmental aspects of poultry rearing, including the housing and diseases of both human and poultry, sur-rounding environment, access to and sources of water, waste management, common property resources, and social conflicts related to the poultry programme. Data were collected through field observations, in-

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depth interviews, and case studies during August 2003. Poultry rearing was found to be a promising income generating activity for the ultra poor. A few obstacles related to health, resource use, resource management, and social conflicts were identified. There were some innovative initiatives taken by the TUP poultry members related to waste management, other sources of income and water access. Some steps were suggested to resolve social conflicts and health problems, to improve poultry housing and waste marketing, to increase nutritional intake and initiate intermediate income-generating projects, and to highlight management issues of common property resource. 28 Improving in-house medical waste management: a pilot research Nasima Akter and MR Ali BRAC has conducted a pilot project on improving in-house medical waste manage-ment in collaboration with three selected hospitals (Dhaka Shishu Hospital, Institute of Child Health and Shishu Shasthya Foundation, and one BRAC upgraded Shushasthya). As an outcome of this project, a manual on in-house medical waste management has been prepared. The pilot programme was designed to build awareness among hospital staff and initiate some action programmes with the hospital staff to streamline the existing waste management systems. To make the pilot programme successful the following steps were selected: i) baseline survey, ii) manual development and training, iii) implementation and follow up, and iv) finalize the manual on in-house medical waste management. The project was implemented during January-August 2004. The baseline survey found that, a number of hospital staff specifically nurses and cleaners had been suffering from various kinds of infectious diseases, such as hepa-titis B/C, skin disease, allergy, infection, diarrhoea, fever, headache, cough, asthma, and typhoid. Nurses were mostly injured

during needle breaking (42%) and ampoule breaking (34%), and cleaners were injured during handling and cleaning waste. It was found that, 60% of sold items were plastics collected by unauthorized waste pickers such as used syringes, saline bags, water bottles, etc. from hospitals. After intro-ducing the in-house management system in three hospitals, the amount of infectious waste became around 2%, recyclable 4-6% and above 90% were general waste that could be dumped to the municipal bin without treatment. Nevertheless, it should be kept in mind that the amount and quality of waste depends on proper segregation, hospital size, services, disease type, waste category, and seasonality. To improve the medical waste management in Bangladesh, we recommend the following: i) raising awareness, training, and capacity building of hospital staff, ii) responsibilities inside hos-pital (designated personnel), iii) monitoring mechanism and committee, iv) role of City Corporation (transportation and central treatment system), v) hospital initiatives for proper medical waste management (cost, return), and vi) private sector and NGOs involvement. 29 Water and sanitation status relating to the poorest in Bangladesh Nasima Akter and Md Jakariya This study aimed to see the level of access to safe water and sanitation and discusses the knowledge on arsenic contamination in drinking water among the poorest in rural Bangladesh. This is a part of baseline survey for CFPR/TUP. Household survey method was used to collect data through structured questionnaire. The survey was conducted during July-September 2002 in Rangpur, Kurigram and Nilphamari districts. Vari-ables considered were safe water and sani-tation. Sources of drinking and cooking water, water quality with regard to arsenic, and knowledge on arsenic contamination were considered under safe water variable.

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Type, practice and ownership of latrine were considered under sanitation. Coverage of access to drinking water for SUP and NSUP of three study districts was above 96% which is similar to national rural water supply coverage (97%). Nevertheless, most of the households did not have their own tubewell and did not guarantee safe drinking water. About 87% of the households drank water from tubewell those were not tested for arsenic contamination. Sanitation cover-age of the study households was 5.4-9.4%, much lower than the national sanitation coverage for rural area (30% or 41% including pit latrines). Lack of awareness along with unavailability of resources are some causes of poor water and sanitation coverage for the poorest. Raising awareness on safe drinking water and sanitation as well as ensuring access to safe drinking water and sanitation in these districts need immediate attention to ensure their healthy and sustainable livelihood. 30 Arsenic in drinking water and birth outcomes: a study of the Bangladesh integrated nutrition programme Md. Jakariya, MQ Sarkar and S Sultana This paper assesses the impact of arsenic exposure on pregnancy outcomes in Bang-ladesh. A total of 261 villages from 3 highly arsenic contaminated upazilas of two districts were selected for this study. The upazilas were Faridpur Sadar of Faridpur district and Matlab and Shahrasti of Chand-pur district. Data were collected during August–September 2003 from 742 women under 106 CNCs from 100 villages of Faridpur Sadar, 710 women from 55 villages under 80 CNCs of Matlab, and 737 women under 33 CNCs from 106 villages of Shahrasti upazila. A total of 2,189 women who gave births in 2002 participated in the study. Their mean age was 26.52 years, the mean duration of arsenic exposure of the participants was 6 years, and the median

was 7 years. The majority of them (72%) used arsenic contaminated water (>50 ppb) for drinking during their last pregnancies. Overall incidence of spontaneous abortion, stillbirth, premature birth, low birth weight, and neonatal death were found to be 23.3/1000 live birth, 26.95/1000 live birth, 42.49/1000 live birth, 113.75/1000 live birth, and 28.78/1000 live birth respec-tively. About 28% of newborn babies were malnourished (<2.5 kg of weight). 31 Evaluation of BRAC nursery with special reference to ecological distribution of plant species Md. Quaiyum, N Akter and Md. Jakariya This study assessed the performance of BRAC nursery, and government and private nurseries with special reference to ecologi-cal distribution of plant species. Data were collected in January-February 2003 using structured questionnaire from 28 BRAC village organization (VO)-operated, 38 government-operated, 38 privately operated, and 15 BRAC-operated nurseries from 32 districts. The average land size of BRAC, government, VO, and private nursery was 697, 194, 60, and 83 decimals respectively. The performance of nurseries was assessed based on production, costs, sales, germina-tion status, environmental issues, and eco-logical distribution of plants. The findings are expected to help design the BRAC nursery programme based on ecological distribution of plant species. 32 Cultivation prospect of medicinal plants in Bangladesh: experiences from Natore Lammia Sharmin The study aimed to explore the possibility of medicinal plant cultivation as a sustainable livelihood option. The study was conducted among the medicinal plant cultivators of five villages of Laxmipur union of Natore

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sadar upazila in Natore district. Both quail-tative and quantitative methods were used. Data were collected during February-April 2004 from both primary and secondary sources. The findings show that the farmers were motivated to cultivate medicinal plants because of its profitability. The cost-benefit

analysis of some of the medicinal plants also supported this. But the market of the medicinal plants is still in a pre-mature stage. A linkage between the cultivators and the herbal medicine or cosmetic producers could definitely help develop the medicinal plant cultivation prospect.

F. OTHER STUDIES 33 Eighteen months of operation: exploring geographical poverty outreach and employment creation of BRAC Bank SME Unit Monique Iglebaek and Imran Matin The Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) sector has increasingly been viewed upon as occupying a crucial position in the economy of Bangladesh. For instance, donor agencies in collaboration with trade agencies have lately intensified their effort to support the SME sector. Moreover, the government has started realising the growth potential of SMEs, albeit active policy steps to assist the sector to flourish by overcoming financial, technological, management and market constraints is still lacking. The SME sector contributes towards the GDP of the country, and employment creation of Bangladesh approximately 140,368,000 inhabitants (WHO). Yet, the SME sector continues to be discriminated against by commercial and government owned banks. Bangladesh’s many microfinance institutions (MFI) lack capital to finance SMEs, or SME entre-preneurs do not meet MFI’s selection criteria. Arguably, lack of access to credit is the most significant problem for capital and institutional growth of the Bangladesh SME sector. BRAC Bank’s SME Unit is the first of its kind to provide financial services on a national scale to small and medium sized entrepreneurs. After 18 months of operation, BRAC Bank approached BRAC RED to undertake an exploratory study on the effect

of BRAC Bank’s SME Unit lending on employment creation. 34 Report on the evaluation of the pilot project on GQAL programme with BRAC’s village organizations Simeen Mahmud and Amina Mahbub The Gender Quality Action Learning (GQAL) programme for VO members was initiated to develop a positive attitude in the society about improving gender relations and enhancing gender equity and equality, which would ultimately contribute to women’s empowerment at individual, social and organizational level. The project was initiated as a two-year pilot in three areas of BRAC’s development programme. Project activities were carried out between November 2001 and December 2003, and an evaluation to assess the effects of the pilot programme was undertaken during February to May 2004. The objectives of the evaluation were to: a) assess, using quarterly monitoring data, whether the outputs in the log frame have been achieved; b) identify whether there is any differences between the cells in terms of villagers’ knowledge, ideology and practice regarding gender issues; c) identify the main factors affecting villagers’ knowledge, ideology and practice regarding gender issues in different cells; and d) examine whether the pilot project is replicable and what are the steps should be taken up for replication of the pilot project nationally.

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35 Can we not get along? In context of 2001 post-election violence Mohammad Rafi The study looked into the changing relation-ship among the religious communities in Bangladesh till the incidence of violence on minorities during the post-parliamentary election of 2001. Besides looking at the relationship from historical perspective the study also investigated into the causes and intensity of violence. During Muslim rule in this region a functional relationship devel-oped particularly among the ruling Muslims and upper class Hindus. These groups to-gether exploited the lower class composing both Hindus and Muslims. The exploitation was not interpreted in communal line. Later on due to divide-and-rule policy of the British rulers the exploitation was taken to communal line – Hindus exploiting the Muslims. The relationship between the two got strained. During Pakistan regime the minorities were discriminated and exploited. With the liberation of Bangladesh it was expected that communal animosity would end once for all. But the country was experi-encing an increase in the intensity of vio-lence on the minorities particularly during and after elections in the recent decades. The violence that minorities experienced after election was observed under four broad heads – action and property related violence, psychological abuse, and physical assault including rape and murder. The study tabbed the incidence of violence throughout the country for six months after election. About 23% of the minorities were violated. The findings from this study as compared with

police record indicated that the incidence of violence on the minorities during the elec-tion was much higher than in any other period. The most important cause of violence is that there are two modes of nationalism – secular (linguistic) and reli-gious (Islamic) which are very much antagonistic to each other – are prevailing in Bangladesh. These modes are again upheld by major political parties. The minorities widely support and cast vote for political parties with linguistic nationalism thus minimized the chance for political parties with religious nationalism in winning the elections. Such a prospect in election made the latter political parties to prevent mino-rities violently from casting vote in the election. The violence on the minorities was carried on even after the election to ensure that the minorities might not vote in the future elections to come. The violence after election was committed by taking advantage of the failure of ‘social control mechanisms’ throughout the country – a situation typi-cally prevails for some time after every election in Bangladesh. The violators had a much lesser chance of being punished for their acts at this period. Finally the Muslim majority in general carries a negative atti-tude towards the minorities because of their orientation about the minorities. Such an attitude aids the determinants of violence against the minorities. To eliminate violence a positive attitude towards the minorities promoting tolerance and recognition of them need to be promoted among the majority Muslims; secular nationalism should be engineered so that the minorities might not be taken as vote bank of a particular poli-tical party.

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Glossary AIDS Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome ANTRIEP Asian Network of Training and Research Institutions in Education

Planning AO Area Office APON Adolescent Peer Organized Network BBS Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics BCDM BRAC Centre for Development Management BCSIR Bangladesh Council of Scientific and Industrial Research BEDP BRAC Economic Development Programme BEMP Bangladesh Environment Management Project BEOC Basic Education for Older Children BEP BRAC Education Programme BHC BRAC Health Centre BHEW Bangladesh Health Equity Watch BIDS Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies BINP Bangladesh Integrated Nutrition Project BIRDEM Bangladesh Institute of Research and Rehabilitation in Diabetes,

Endocrine and Metabolic Disorders BRRI Bangladesh Rice Research Institute CAMPE Campaign for Popular Education CFPR/TUP Challenging the Frontiers of Poverty Reduction – Targeting the Ultra Poor CHT Chittagong Hill Tracts CIDA Canadian International Development Agency CLP Char Livelihood Programme CNC Community Nutrition Centres CNP Community Nutrition Promoters CPD Centre for Policy Dialogue CSW Commercial Sex Workers DANIDA Danish International Development Agency DFID Department for International Development DOTS Directly Observed Treatment Short Course DSS Demographic Surveillance System DU Dhaka University

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ECD Early Childhood Development EFA Education for All EHC Essential Healthcare EIC Education for Indigenous Children EPI Expanded Programme on Immunization ESTEEM Effective Schools through Enhanced Education Management FGD Focus Group Discussion FIVIMS Food Insecurity and Vulnerability Information and Mapping Systems GDP Gross Domestic Product GoB Government of Bangladesh GQAL Gender Quality Action Learning GSC Gram Shahayak Committee HIV Human Immunodeficiency Virus HNPP Health, Nutrition and Population Programme IAS Impact Assessment Study ICDDR,B International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh IDRC International Development Research Centre, Canada IGVGD Income Generation for Vulnerable Group Development INDEPTH International Network of field sites for continuous Demographic

Evaluation of Populations and Their Health in developing countries IPI Income Poverty Index IRRI International Rice Research Institute JLI Joint Learning Initiative KK Kishor-Kishori (adolescents) KMC Kangaroo Mother Care LBW Low Birth Weight MCH-FP Maternal and Child Health-Family Planning MDG Millennium Development Goals MFI Microfinance Institutions MI Micronutrient Initiative MIS Management Information System NAEM National Academy for Educational Management (GoB) NFPE Non-formal Primary Education NGO Non-governmental Organization NORAD The Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation NOVIB The Netherlands Organization for International Development Cooperation OTEP Oral Therapy Extension Programme

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PHC Primary Healthcare PHILL Primary Healthcare in Later Life PO Programme Organizer PRA Participatory Rural Appraisal RED Research and Evaluation Division RRA Rapid Rural Appraisal SES Socioeconomic Studies SIDA Swedish International Development Agency SME Small and Medium Enterprises SRI System of Rice Intensification SS Shasthya Shebika (Female Village Health Volunteer) TARC Training and Resource Centre TB Tuberculosis UN United Nations UNDP United Nations Development Programme UNESCO United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization UNFPA United Nations Population Fund UNICEF United Nations Children’s Fund UP Union Parishad USAID United States Agency for International Development VO Village Organization WB World Bank WFP World Food Programme WHO World Health Organization

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Index A Abstracts 42 Acknowledgements vi Adolescent survey 22 Agriculture, food and nutrition, Studies

on 17, 49 Anaemia prevalence survey 15, 49 Arsenic studies, Abstract 55 Assessment of basic competencies 7 B BHEW activities 17 Billboard 11 Books and book chapters 40 BRAC Afghanistan 4 BRAC at a glance 4 BRAC Bank, Study on 22, 56 BRAC Education Programme 3 BRAC Health Programme 4 BRAC, Introducing 3 BRAC nurseries, Evaluation of 21, 55 BRAC primary schools, Study on 19 BRAC vision 3 C Capacity development 28 CFPR/TUP programme 3, 13 CFPR/TUP publications 11 CFPR/TUP research 13, 17, 42-5, 53,

54 CFPR/TUP working paper 39, 43-5, 48 Char Livelihood Programme 14 Child-to-child intervention 16 Collaborative research 8 Commissioned research 8

Competency achievement of BRAC students 19, 52

D Dissemination 11, 33 Doctoral programme 28 E Early Childhood Development, Study on

16, 48 Editorials, letters and abstracts 41 Education programme 3 Education studies 19, 20 Education studies, Abstracts of 51 Education studies, Ongoing 24 Education Watch 7, 20 Elderly health, Baseline survey 47 Elite support for ultra poor 42 Elite’s role in public health provision 22 Environmental studies 21 Environmental studies, Abstracts of 53 Environmental studies, Ongoing 24 Equity Watch paper 39 Ethnic minorities, Study on 15 External publications 39 F Flexible administration of sprinkles 18 Flood disaster management, Abstract

53 Flood relief operation, Quick survey 22 Food consumption survey 14, 49 Formative research 18

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G Gender and good governance 42, 46 Glossary 58 GQAL study, Abstract 56 Growth and development of RED 7 H Health and population studies,

Abstracts 46 Health equity watch 17 Health, population and nutrition studies

15 Health, population and nutrition

studies, Ongoing 24 Health programme 4 Health-seeking behaviour 46 Higher education programme 28 HIV/AIDS baseline survey 46

I Impact assessment study 7 In-country training 28 INDEPTH Network 17 Indigenous children, Education for 20,

51 Intern 31 Internal publications 39

K Kangaroo mother care, Study on 16

L Low birth weight survey 15

M Management and finance 11 Medical waste management 21, 54 Medicinal plant cultivation, Study on

21, 50, 55 Microfinance, Study on 14, 43 Micronutrient sprinkles 17, 18 Micronutrient supplementation 18, 50

N Newsletter 11 Newsletter and newspaper articles 41 NFPE school 2 NFPE students, Studies on 19, 52 Nirjash 11 Non-communicable diseases, Study on

15 O Obituary 12 Ongoing studies 24 OTEP study 7 Overseas training 28 P Participatory wealth ranking 6, 12 PHILL baseline survey 47 PHILL project 17, 47 Piped water system, Assessment of 21 Post-election violence, Abstract 57 Poverty alleviation, empowerment and

human well-being, Studies on 13, 42

Pre-primary learners, Study on 19, 51 Preface v Presentations in conferences, seminars

and workshops 37 Primary education, Study on 20, 51, 52 Primary healthcare for elderly 17 Process documentation research 51 Programmatic research 8 Programme support enterprises 4 Publications, List of 39 Q Qualitative research workshop 29 Quality primary education, Study on

20, 51, 52 R RED, Growth and development of 7 RED management and finance 11 RED seminar 34 RED Update 11 Research compendium 11

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Research highlights 13 Research output 10 Rural Energy, Pilot research 21 S School management, Study on 20, 52 Slum dwellers, Study on 15 Social capital baseline survey 13 Socioeconomic studies, Ongoing 25 Sprinkles studies 17, 18 Support extended to others 30

V Vegetable cultivation 14 Violence, Study on post-election 57 VO meeting 2 W Wealth ranking 6, 12 Working papers, CFPR/TUP 39

CFPR/TUP Working Paper Series Stories of targeting: process documentation of selecting the ultra poor for CFPR/TUP programme

- CFPR/TUP Research Team. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada, 2004. xii, 34p. (CFPR/TUP working paper series No. 1).

Combining methodologies for better targeting of the extreme poor: lessons from BRAC’s CFPR/TUP programme - Matin I and Halder SR. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada,

2004. vi, 19p. (CFPR/TUP working paper series No. 2). Engaging elite support for the poorest? BRAC’s experience with the ultra poor programme - Hossain N and Matin I. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada,

2004. vi, 17p. (CFPR/TUP working paper series No. 3). Exploring changes in the lives of the ultra poor: an exploratory study on CFPR/TUP members - Matin I and Walker S. Dhaka and Ottawa: BRAC and Aga Khan Foundation Canada,

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