NGOs overlap programmes
Say NGO bureau officials
NGO Affairs Bureau (NGOAB) has decided to limit the non-government organisations' programmes so they cannot get concentrated in the same places with the same projects.
Some NGOs are operating in the same places for the same beneficiary groups, said the bureau officials.
Such concentration deprives thousands of remote area people of the services and facilities provided by the development organisations, they added.
According to a senior official, the bureau found at least ten districts where more than fifty foreign funded NGOs have been working.
And they don not know how many local NGOs are operating in the same areas, he said.
He added the same people constantly benefit from the programmes of those NGOs, which deprives the poor and underprivileged people of other remote areas and districts.
“During approval and foreign fund release, we scrutinise these issues to avoid concentration and make more people to benefit across the country,” Khurshid Alam, deputy director of NGOAB, recently told The Daily Star.
Some NGOs concentrate their programmes in Dhaka, Chittagong, Jessore, Barisal, Tangail, Khulna, Dinajpur and Sirajganj for better communication facilities, said the bureau sources.
Data show 1180 foreign funded NGOs out of 1420 in Dhaka division have programmes in Dhaka district alone while only three NGOs work in Sherpur of the same district.
It was also found 81 foreign funded NGOs have been working in Chittagong, 42 in Barisal, 38 in Tangail, 68 in Jessore, 51 in Khulna, 44 in Dinajpur, and 30 in Sirajganj.
Only three NGOs are found operating in Laxmipur, Munshiganj, and Sherpur and five NGOs in Panchagarh, Chuadanga, and Feni.
Most of these organisations' projects involve informal education; primary, maternal, and child health care; and different awareness programmes on education, family planning, sanitation, safe drinking water, women empowerment and girl children's education etc.
NGOAB has taken stricter steps during fund release for the micro-finance operators in Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT), said Khurshid.
He added just one NGO is allowed to operate the micro-credit among the same loan receivers in CHT areas.
Tajul Islam of NGO Federation of Bangladesh, an apex body of over 500 local and national NGOs, told The Daily Star that the programme and area concentration is a problem.
He said it should be handled effectively so everyone can get the services and facilities provided by the non-government organisations.
He also pointed out that other regulatory body can also consider the problem and undertake to take the NGO facilities to large number of underprivileged population of remote areas.
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