Project profile — BRAC Strategic Partnership Arrangement - BRAC-SPA

• Bangladesh (100.00%)

• Education, Level Unspecified: Education facilities and training (11120) (4.00%)
• Primary education:
Primary education (11220) (2.00%)
Basic life skills for youth and adults (11230) (3.00%)
• Secondary Education: Vocational training (11330) (3.00%)
• Basic health care:
Basic health care (12220) (5.00%)
Basic nutrition (12240) (4.00%)
• Health: COVID-19 control (12264) (33.00%)
• Population policy and administrative management:
Population policy and administrative management (13010) (20.00%)
Reproductive health care (13020) (12.00%)
Family planning (13030) (5.00%)
• Government And Civil Society, General: Ending violence against women and girls (15180) (9.00%)

• Gender equality (significant objective)
• Environmental sustainability (cross-cutting) (significant objective)
• Participatory development and good governance (significant objective)
• Trade development (not targeted)
• Biodiversity (not targeted)
• Climate change mitigation (not targeted)
• Climate Change Adaptation (significant objective)
• Urban issues (not targeted)
• Desertification (not targeted)
• Children's issues (significant objective)
• Youth Issues (significant objective)
• Disaster Risk Reduction(DRR) (not targeted)
• Indigenous Issues (significant objective)
• Disability (significant objective)
• Nutrition (not targeted)
• ICT as a tool for development (not targeted)

This project aims to empower the most underserved and disenfranchised women and girls in Bangladesh (including those with disabilities) to gain greater access to and control over resources, decisions and actions that affect their lives. The project components are designed to achieve the following goals: (1) lowering levels of extreme poverty; (2) increasing access to quality essential services for the poorest and most marginalized groups in Bangladesh; (3) creating employment opportunities for underprivileged youth, extremely poor disabled people and migrants; (4) increasing economic and social empowerment of women; (5) improving the status of women and girls and reduce violence against women girls; and (6) improving COVID-19 management by communities. Project activities include: (1) enabling 6,650 households to graduate from extreme poverty with better sustainable livelihoods and socioeconomic resilience; (2) strengthening the resilience of 17,500 climate vulnerable households; (3) providing comprehensive health and SRHR services to 100,000 people; (4) supporting 5,550 children (at least 50% girls and 2% with disabilities) to complete primary education with better learning competencies; (5) training 1,360 people with marketable skills linked to decent employment opportunities; (6) providing counseling and legal aid services to 20,750 women survivors of violence against women; (7) engaging with over 1 million people through awareness efforts on violence against women and children and prevention of child marriage; (8) producing and distributing reusable cloth masks among the low-income people to slow down community transmission of COVID-19; (9) improving protective health initiatives through community engagement and communication for better case management, infection prevention, risk reduction and awareness building; and (10) creating access to livelihood support mechanisms in post-pandemic recovery.

The expected outcomes for this project include: (1) increased use of critical services (livelihood, finance, assets, education, health, water and sanitation, and legal aid services), especially by marginalized women and girls in hard to reach areas; (2) improved services and mechanisms (e.g. legal, SRHR, sexual and gender-based violence, and child marriage) at the local level to respond to gender-specific constraints on rights; (3) improved capacity of national government to effectively implement gender-responsive policies; and (4) increased community adherence to COVID-19 preventive measures and decreased effects of COVID-19 at the community levels.

Results achieved as of March 2024: (1) provided financial and business development services to 22,186,252 people (19,952,361 women, 2,233,512 men, and 379 transgender), ultra-poor households and enterprises; (2) provided economic empowerment support to 15,020,341 women; (3) trained 93,038 people (47,678 women, 45,326 men, and 34 transgender) on employability and entrepreneurship skills for decent employment; (4) 489,358 students (267,068 girls and 222,290 boys) graduated from non-formal primary schools and Non-Profit Organizations (NGO) partner schools; (5) increased awareness of 58,0000 girls about gender equality, prevention of child, early, forced marriage, and prevented 427 child marriages; (6) provided legal services, counselling, rehabilitation, and medical support to 45,114 survivors of violence against women and girls; (7) provided support to 617,310 people to prevent and respond to sexual and gender-based violence. This includes child, early and forced marriage and female genital mutilation; (8) provided disaster risk reduction and immediate emergency support to 18,500 vulnerable households; (9) trained 5,790 health care service providers on Sexual Reproduction and Health Rights; and (10) reached 4,280,490 people with health services.

• Proactive disclosure