720 Char dwellers of Kurigram becoming self-reliant gradually
Kurigram Correspondent :
The country is advancing fast towards desired development, is dreaming of building happy, prosperous, and hunger free Smart Bangladesh by 2041.
So, it should not be right to build Smart Bangladesh leaving the char dwellers behind.
Taking this in view, FRIENDSHIP, an international social purpose organization based in Bangladesh took an initiative to bring the char dwellers under the mainstream of development through involving them in a welfare project entitled Transitional Fund (ASD) under Climate Action sector is being implemented for 720 char dwellers in Sadar, Chilmari and Rowmari Upazilas under Kurigram district and the project by Md. Nayeem Khan, General Manager of same sector.
With the financial assistance of Friendship Luxembourg, Friendship, a non -government organization of the country, is implementing the project designed for five years for the underprivileged and disadvantaged char dwellers of the Upazilas aimed at improving their living standard for making them self-dependent economically along with ensuring equal dignity through providing them with season- wise good seed of various vegetables and sheep.
The organization is encouraging Community Based Vegetable Cultivation so that vegetable production continues even during flood and also facilitating ginger cultivation through sack method, papaya cultivation, production and use of vermicompost instead of chemical fertilizers in vegetable cultivation.
Apart from it, to ensure good governance among the char dwellers and to eradicate social problems like child marriage, domestic violence side by side with building their capacity on facing natural disasters are also the objectives of the project, said Senior Project Manager Kbd. Md. Ashraful Islam Mollick.
The beneficiaries started changing their socio-economic condition by sheep rearing, vermicompost production, ginger cultivation through sack method and vegetables farming.
Aheton Begum, a beneficiary woman of Sadar Upazila, said like other beneficiaries, she received a sheep worth three thousand and six hundred taka and seed of vegetables of sixteen varieties from the project.
After rearing the sheep on the char land and the farming vegetable on the homestead, the number of sheep has increased, and the vegetable farming is also extended at the homestead at larger scale.
Now she has four sheep the price of sheep has stood at 28 thousand taka.
She earned 24 thousand taka through selling vegetables in the local market after meeting the family demand and also earning 2 thousand taka by selling vermicompost in every month.
