Institutionalizing Local Level Poverty Monitoring System (LLPMS)
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Institutionalizing Local Level Poverty Monitoring System (LLPMS) Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development (BARD) Kotbari, Comilla Bangladesh July 2013 0 | P a g e I Project Overview 1 Title of the Institutionalizing Local Level Poverty Monitoring System (LLPMS) Project 2 Project Proponent a Name of Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development (BARD) Institution b Name of Head of Mr. Md. Mashiur Rahman Institution c Mailing Address Kotbari, Comilla, Bangladesh d Telephone and Tel. +88 081 60600 Fax Numbers Fax. +88 081 68406 e E-mail Address [email protected] f Web-site www.bard.gov.bd g Brief Profile of Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development (BARD) was established the Proponent in 1959 basically as a training institute. In course of time, however, it Institution has combined training with research and pilot experimentation. The unified approach of training, research and pilot experimentation to solve problems of rural areas has given special significance to the activities of the Academy. Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development (BARD) as a national institute of rural development in Bangladesh is mandated to perform specific functions which are: 1) provide training to government officials and others concerned with rural development; 2) conduct research in rural development and allied fields; 3) test and experiment on concepts and theories of development; 4) provide advisory and consultative service to the Government and other agencies; 5) guide and supervise students, national and foreign, in their dissertation works; 6) arrange and conduct national and international seminars, conferences and workshops, and 7) help policy planners in the field of rural development. In order to perform these functions, it has 09 divisions, of which four are service divisions and 05 are academic divisions. Rural Economics and Management, Rural Administration and Local Government, Rural Sociology and Demography, Rural Education and Social Development and Agriculture and Environment Development are the academic Divisions and rest four i.e. Research; Project, Training and Administration are the service divisions of the Academy. As a strategy it experiments the new thoughts and idea of rural development in a smaller scale. After getting desired result the Academy handed over the programme to the government for replication the project in a wider scale. As a result of systematic experimentation BARD was able to develop some unique models of rural development. 1 | P a g e Comilla Approach to Rural Development that includes Rural works Programme, Thana Training and Development Centre, Two Tier cooperatives and Thana irrigation Programme is worth mentioning which are being replicated by different organizations in all over the country. Recently, BARD has been able to develop two other models of rural development namely Comprehensive Village Development Programme (CVDP) and Small Farmers and Landless Laborer Development Program (SFDP). SFDP now become independent organizations in the banner of SFDF and CVDP becomes a national project to cover the whole country. BARD has conducted an action research namely Local Level Poverty Monitoring System (LLPMS) in collaboration with IDRC Canada through CBMS Network, the Philippines. By combining the experiences of CVDP and LLPMS BARD has recently conducted an another action research namely Strengthening Institutional Capabilities and Rural Population for Territorial Development in Chittagong (SICRP) in collaboration with ETEA Foundation for Development and Cooperation and Spanish Agency for Development and International Cooperation (AECID), Spain. BARD has been conducting another project namely E-Parishad for introducing the information communication technology to provide better services to the people. Recently BARD has employed huge efforts to train the elected leaders of the newly activated Upazila Parishad (Local government unit at sub national level) and Union Parishad (Local government at the lowest level). It is planning to organize more other training for the officials and leaders of Upazila Parishad in this year. UNDP and UNICIEF have supported to organize these training courses. In 2010 BARD conducted a training workshop on Local Governance and Rural Development for the Officials of Commonwealth Countries in collaboration Commonwealth Secretariat, UK. 3 Abstract of the For institutionalizing the community level poverty monitoring system Proposed training materials will be developed considering the capacity of local Project leaders. Besides the standard indicators of LLPMS an initiative will be taken to integrate a process of capturing indicators related to youth employment and assessing entrepreneurial environment at rural areas with a view to integrate the process with standard LLPMS process. A standing committee of Union Parishad will be formed or activated for conducting local level poverty monitoring system. A core team of Faculty members of BARD will be developed through their active participation in the process of LLPMS so that BARD can offer a training course on Local Level Poverty Monitoring System on a regular basis. Under the guidance of standing committee and research assistants of the project local people will be engaged in data collection and calculation of core indicators of LLPMS. Finally, the functionaries of 2 | P a g e Union Parishad will be trained to prepare five year plan of UP by utilizing the information gathered through the process of LLPMS. Process and lessons learned through this process will be disseminated by organizing two workshops. Finally, training materials and process of the LLPMS will be updated by incorporating the experiences and feedback from different stakeholders. In that way BARD would be able to provide technical supports to other Union Parishads for implementing Local Level Poverty Monitoring System. If, necessary BARD would make advocacy for issuing administrative directive to implement the LLPMS in other areas of Bangladesh. II Project Administrative Information Project Leader/Director Mr. Abdullah Al Mamun Position in the Institution Joint Director Mailing Address Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development (BARD), Kotbari, Comilla E-mail [email protected] Telephone +88 081 (60601-6) Extn. 313 + 88 01716848910 Facsimile +88 081 68406 III. Background and Rationality Under MIMAP-Bangladesh, the Poverty Monitoring System is developed and pilot-tested the methodology and the indicators for a Local Level Poverty Monitoring System. The experimentation was carried out by the Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development (BARD) in consultation with the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS) in the year of 2001- 2002. The pilot testing was kept limited in four villages of Sreepur Union of Choudagram Upazila to acquire the required insights prior to its wider replication. With the successful outcomes of the pilot phase, the experimental phase is expanded in a Union named Muhammadpur (West) under Daudkandi Upazila covering all villages to examine its effectiveness at the Ward and Union levels. It is expected that an operational LLPMS at the Union level will play a complementary role with the national initiatives of poverty monitoring in providing both poverty and development related information and policy guidelines. The experimentation is carried out by BARD with the financial and technical support of IDRC, Canada through Community Based Monitoring System (CBMS), during 2003-2005 with a view to creating a community based poverty monitoring system at the local level in Bangladesh and 3 | P a g e ensuring active participation of and effective use of relevant information by the local government functionaries. By utilizing the experiences of LLPMS and another project of BARD namely CVDP , BARD conducted an action research project namely Strengthening Institutional Capabilities and Rural Population for Territorial Development in Chittagong (SICRP) in collaboration with ETEA Foundation for Development and Cooperation and Spanish Agency for Development and International Cooperation (AECID), Spain . The main outcome of the project was to strengthen the capacity of local government and village organizations to provide support services according to the need of rural people. Developing database by ensuring participation of community people at the union level and using the information of database for preparing plan of local government at the grassroots level was one of the main strategies of this project. Generating youth employment and developing entrepreneurial environment in the rural areas are considered very crucial for overall development of a country. A few local government units at the grassroots level play their potential role in this sector. Identification of areas where the local government can play their role and sensitize the functionaries of local government is essential for entrepreneurship development of the country. A very good portion of people in Bangladesh is youth. Creation of job in the formal sector is very challenging in a country like Bangladesh. Youth people have the capacity to transform their idea into reality if they get the positive environment. For that reason an initiative will be taken in this phase of LLPMS to find out a process for capturing information related to youth employment and assessing entrepreneurial environment at the rural areas with a view to assess the feasibility to incorporate those with the standard methods of LLPMS. At the national level poverty is monitored by conducting Household Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES)