RES Initiative                                                                   

It has been a long time in my mind to do something for people who are disadvantaged, poor and most vulnerable in our society, especially who live in rural areas. My home is in the village of Char Hari Pur and all my family members are living there. I was able to see the real scenario of the poor people in the village as I was growing up as I spent a significant time there, and when I travel back home I stay in the village. There are millions of poor people around the country and many of them are in my neighborhood. I think this is the time to do something for the poor and for humanity. If our little effort can bring happiness in someone’s life, we will feel our life is worthy and valuable. 

Moving away from my home for my education, I realized that I am now in a comfortable position in Australia whereas my fellow villagers still struggle tremendously to provide three meals in a day for their family. It is beyond their imagination that a government in a first world country helps those low income people by providing subsidy. In Bangladesh where 40% people live under the poverty line and 90% of peoples live in villages, forwarding a helping hand through the public sector is almost impossible. Work has commenced in private and NGO sectors, but is still limited. Can we do something for them?

I have struggled a lot in my life but I was fortunate. Although my family is rich by Bangladeshi standards, my father did not have to spend any money for my education. I got many scholarships after my primary school including my Bachelors, Master’s Degrees and my PhD. I feel honored and thankful to God for his mercy on me, that I have traveled to many parts of the world and studied in countries like Malaysia, Germany, USA and Australia. I gained knowledge and experience and enjoyed staying in these countries.

But when I travel back to my home country, Bangladesh, I have mixed feelings - feelings of happiness and sadness. Sometimes I feel that I do not wish to expose it to the outside world but on the other hand I feel the world should know about poor peoples’ lives. People live in this developed part of the world counting thousands of dollars every month and spending hundreds of dollars every day, but in that part of the world people can not afford food, clothing, or medicine and they are not able to send their children to school. They need only a dollar a day to have food and to live without starvation. They are not weak, they are strong and able to work but they do not have any means of survival. At that moment, I simply help them financially. That little financial help might erase their short-term need but what about the next time? Can we do anything for them which will sustain their social or economical development?

My family lives in a rural village. There was no electricity or brick road until a few years back. During my childhood I used to read with a kerosene lamp. Today I cannot see even a word in the book with a kerosene lamp. There are frequent blackouts every night in our country. So, my nephews and cousins often need to read with a kerosene lamp when there is a blackout. Electricity is only in rich people’s houses and poor people are still using kerosene lamps because they cannot afford it. 

My house is still a few miles away from the brick road. There are no taxis or public buses from the village to the city. I often take a rickshaw, a three wheeler transportation mode driven by a man, pedaling. Whenever I am in a rickshaw, I have a good chance to talk to the rickshaw driver and many of them are just my neighbors. I know them very well because I played with them during my childhood. I feel very sad. It is very unfortunate. They are all young in age but their faces are full of poverty, misery and unhappiness. Their fathers were poor, now they are poor, and their children will be poor. They can only manage food if they go to work, and if they cannot go for work they have to live without food. By pedaling a rickshaw a whole day they earn 120 tk to 150 tk ($3,) half of which goes to the rickshaw owner. It is not their own rickshaw. They do not have the money to buy it so they borrow it for a day.

Our country has monsoon seasons. Rains come continuously for several days and no one goes out. Then the misery comes to these poor people’s houses. They starve with their children. Their wives have nothing to do whether it is monsoon or dry season. They sit for whole days at home, doing nothing. Many have three to four even five children. Parents cannot manage to buy their food and clothes so there is no question about school. Due to their misery and misfortune, quarreling remains in their home as a continuous routine.

I have seen in my village young boys and adult men who are just sitting for whole days talking about various issues including what President Bush does in the USA. They do not have any job or any work to do. Most of them are illiterate but a few can read and write, having left school during their childhood. A few of those people have little land which they can cultivate. For cultivation, they need seed, fertilizer and irrigation which also require money. During the cultivation season, they borrow money from money lenders with high interest rates. After harvesting what crops they get, much goes to paying back the money lender.

In rural villages, women are usually sitting down in their homes. Many of them gather together chatting or just visiting here and there. Those capable rural women are not financially contributing to their family; therefore they have little influence in their family’s decision making. Though there are some social constraints that restrict their movement outside the home, they can work and earn from their home. Animal husbandry would be one of the possible solutions to the problem.

Need for an Institution:                    

There are some public urban-based institutions in Bangladesh which are targeting only young people. Unfortunately, these institutions are somewhat inactive and suffer from lack of efficient manpower and resources. Moreover, it involves time and cost to get such training which is sometimes unaffordable and not accessible to villages. In rural areas of Bangladesh, a significant number of the poor and women are not getting access to any sort of income generating activities due to lack of financial and operational support from the existing training institutions. Therefore, poor and poverty stricken women remain unattended and isolated.

At the same time, those existing training institutions only train people and do not provide any operational or financial support to implement the trainee’s own project. Until recently, some of my personal attempts have proven successful but it can be done more effectively and widely if we can form an institution that will provide a comprehensive solution that will train poor villagers and particularly the women to do animal husbandry. Having personal experiences with such rural people, I could help to develop individual efforts such as animal husbandry into an institutional form that might work more efficiently and widely towards helping rural poor men, women and families. To make a constructive effort it is essential to form an institution. So, I proposed to form “Rural Emancipation Society (RES)” to attain the following objectives (please see in objectives).

Our Focus:                                        

The intention of the organization is to be “not-for-profit”. We will provide training support and incorporate rural community people in our program. Within the program, we will provide small to medium sized loans to poor villagers, particularly the women, for producing and growing agro-based livestock, especially animal husbandry. We will share the earned profit on a 50% share basis after the loan has been repaid. The shared earned money will be used for further expansion of this project and to cover administrative costs.