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19 August 2022
Pregnant Midwife Serves Pregnant Mothers During Sylhet Floods
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Press Release
15 July 2022
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’s Message on World Youth Skills Day 15 July 2022
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Press Release
14 July 2022
Further USD 5 Million Flash Flood Relief for Bangladesh announced by UN
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The Sustainable Development Goals in Bangladesh
The Sustainable Development Goals are a global call to action to end poverty, protect the earth’s environment and climate, and ensure that people everywhere can enjoy peace and prosperity. These are the goals the UN is working on in Bangladesh:
Story
19 August 2022
Pregnant Midwife Serves Pregnant Mothers During Sylhet Floods
“The floods occurred so fast, literally in one day. In the morning, I came to the hospital for a normal work day. When I left home, there was chaos everywhere. People were rushing all over the place and the roads were all covered in water.”
This is how Hazera Akther, a 26-year old midwife from Sardar Upazila Health Complex in Sunamganj District describes the fear and anxiety that engulfed the people of northeastern Bangladesh in June of this year, when floods hit the region’s Sunamganj, Sylhet and Netrokona districts.
While the districts had endured natural disasters in the past, this year’s floods were both unexpected and exceptionally intense for the region, which resulted in the local communities not being adequately prepared for the disaster. Close to 500,000 people had to evacuate their homes and many basic services were severely compromised.
This included Hazera’s hospital, where she has been working as part of UNFPA-supported mentorship programme since 2020. An estimated 25,000 people took shelter in the hospital and for the first three days, the midwives had to perform their duties without electricity and a functioning telecommunications network.
“All the rooms of the hospital were just packed with people. A lot of the families also brought their dogs, hens and goats with them. It was smelly and there was dung everywhere. However, we always made sure that the delivery room remained unoccupied. During the first three days, there was no electricity so at night, we did all the deliveries, surgeries and all other necessary procedures in candlelight,” Hazera explains.
One night, a woman from a nearby village who had just delivered a baby at home arrived in the hospital, bleeding profusely. “She had postpartum hemorrhage and had somehow managed to take a boat to our hospital after being referred here by the dai (traditional birth attendant) who had performed the delivery.”
With no possibility of calling senior doctors in other hospitals for advice, Hazera depended on her own expertise to solve the difficult case. Miraculously, she was able to identify a bad tear inside the woman and repair it with the help of her colleagues in the candlelit room. “This was definitely the most challenging thing I had to do during the crisis,” Hazera says with a hearty laugh.
Throughout all these hardships, Hazera herself was 5 months pregnant with her first child. For three days, she was not able to reach her husband or family in Chadpur District who were worried to death about how she was surviving the flood. “All updates they could receive of the situation in Sunamganj through the news, which was so traumatizing for them.”
When Hazera was finally able to reconnect with them, the family pressured her to stop working and if possible, return to her village. Hazera had considered the possibility herselfonce the floods began. “I admit that my first thought was that I would not go out. Because was pregnant myself, I thought that I should save myself before I saved anybody else. I felt I would need to take a step back from my service,” Hazera explains.
“However, when I thought about the plight of other pregnant women, I knew I could not stop working. Knowing exactly the struggle they were going through, how could I neglect my duty? I had to be there for them.” she continues.
Witnessing the heroism and sacrifices of her colleagues throughout the crisis further confirmed to Hazera that she had made the right decision. As pregnant woman kept being referred to the hospital from smaller villages, many of her colleagues kept working after their shift was over. As transportation options were limited, the midwives often waded to work through chest-deep water and performed their duties in wet uniforms.
“Amidst all this, I was so proud that I was coming to the hospital to serve other pregnant mothers. As a pregnant woman myself, I was able to relate to them. I listened to their worries about money, food scarcity and other things. I was able to comfort them by reminding them that the floods would not last forever and that soon, we would all return home,” she concludes.
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Story
13 January 2022
Together as One UN for Women’s Economic Empowerment
Women’s economic empowerment is at the core of inclusive economic development of communities and countries. Given the many barriers that women and girls face in accessing economic opportunities, UNCDF, UNDP and UN Women came together with an unique approach towards women’s economic empowerment in Bangladesh.
The initiative originated from a global programme titled the “Inclusive Economic and Local Development Programme (IELD)”, funded by Sweden, Switzerland and Norway. The programme sought to facilitate the design, implementation, and sustainability of local investments by governments and the private sector to remove barriers to women’s economic empowerment. The programme also aimed at reversing some of the discriminatory social norms and practices that thwart women’s equitable access to economic opportunities.
In Bangladesh, the three agencies looked at two key constraints. First, women entrepreneurs, especially in the cottage, micro, small, and medium scale enterprises (CMSMEs) have very limited access to finance. During 2010-2018, only 3.5% of the total BDT9.4 million in credit disbursed to CMSME entrepreneurs went to women entrepreneurs. Second, women lack sustainable employment for resilience against shocks. Rural women, including those getting microfinance, training and running small businesses, tend to fall back into poverty when faced with shocks like natural hazards, job losses in the family or ill-health, the COVID pandemic or market volatility. Moreover, socio-cultural and other structural barriers also impede women’s economic empowerment.
To address these challenges, the IELD program engaged the local authorities, project developers and women’s groups to identify, fund and implement women’s economic empowerment projects; built capacities of local government for gender-responsive economic policy, planning and budgeting; and identified practical and innovative financial instruments to channel additional funding for SME financing and capacity building for private sector players including commercial banks and women entrepreneurs.
Individual women under economic stress do not have the leverage to negotiate with other economic actors even in well-functioning markets. So IELD enabled the power of collective knowledge and bargaining by linking women entrepreneurs to groups like (i) Women-led SMEs (ii) Women Development Forums (WDFs), a collective group of women’s elected representatives at local government bodies (iii) NGO-led social enterprises and (iv) Women led cooperatives. Since 2018, IELD has initiated eight investment projects related to women’s economic empowerment in Bangladesh with a total project size of $1.4 million. The total investment of $ 287,238 unlocked an additional $1.1 million from local partners, including governments, private companies, banks, and local government bodies. Against $1 of seed capital invested, US$4 was unlocked from domestic sources. Over 2535 women have benefitted directly from these projects as suppliers, traders and employees and 1014 jobs were created locally.
Encouraged by the success of IELD in catalyzing local investment, when the IELD project in Bangladesh ended, the three agencies – UNCDF, UNDP and UN Women decided to design the next phase of the programme appropriate to the specific context of Bangladesh and mobilize fund locally. The new project titled Women’s Empowerment for Inclusive Growth (WING) started in 2020 building on existing programme approach and partnerships. Funded by the Government of the Netherlands, the project sought to contribute to the Government’s aim of inclusive growth as articulated in its 8th five-year plan. As part of the WING project, some of the global tools of IELD are being implemented in Bangladesh and embedded into national institutions. For instance, the Women’s Economic Empowerment Index for evaluating the social impact and financial feasibility of investments has been institutionalized with Bangladesh Bank. Capacity development for gender responsive budgeting and planning with local government and promotion of UNWOMEN’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs) with private sector is being carried out, complemented by local level and national level advocacy for women’s economic empowerment. During COVID pandemic, Anondomela, an e-commerce platform was one of the innovations that helped women SMEs in linking with the market with WING support.
With a small seed funding, the three agencies UNCDF, UNDP and UN Women are taking a systems approach to address the issue of women’s economic empowerment by building a conducive policy and institutional set up, empowering partner organizations for women’s entrepreneurship to leverage the power of collectivity, and improving access to finance by generating local investments. The approach brings together the programme infrastructure and comparative expertise of the three agencies to generate outstanding returns on the initial seed funding. While the three agencies contribute to different aspects of the programme, by approaching local government officials and partner organizations together, the joint project is also reducing transactions cost for the Government and partners through time saved in meetings, better management of events, and more coherent and smooth information sharing. Joint communication and synchronized collaboration with national and local government actors has also led to better coordinated work and minimized the duplication of efforts.
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Story
05 July 2022
Conference on Women and Violent Extremism in Bangladesh
Female radicalization is an under-studied and growing problem in Bangladesh, requiring specific research and program attention. Understanding it and the role of women in Violent Extremism is critical to prevention efforts.
UN Agencies in collaboration with Centre for Genocide Studies, University of Dhaka brought together diverse stakeholders working on the prevention and countering of violent extremism (PVE and CVE), and Counter Terrorism (CT) to share and discuss research findings and experience in responding to female radicalization, identify existing policy and programmatic gaps and highlight good practices and lessons learned.
Discussion centered around the influence of social media in the radicalization process and online propaganda targeting women. It was clear through the research findings that while many women are passive actors, some play active roles in radicalization and violent extremism. It was also obvious that promoting alternative narratives and strengthening the narratives of tolerance and pluralism, including in education remains a collective effort.
Women therefore need to be at the center of PVE efforts and be enabled to play active roles in preventing it.
The National Action Plan on Women Peace and Security serves as a national roadmap for women’s active and equal participation in prevention, peace and security and helps to coordinate efforts, including to counter and prevent female radicalization, we must continue to give importance to community engagement and women’s participation in PVE. The conference specifically highlighted:
The importance of community engagement along with conventional policing in countering and preventing of VE.
The need to study the relationship between gender-based violence and violent extremism.
The need for more efforts to monitor and analyze VE online propaganda targeting women, disseminate findings among P/CVE actors, and promote alternative narratives.
Bringing women more to the center of PVE measures, including woman centric or tailored PVE programs targeting women
Need to strengthen the narratives of tolerance and pluralism, including in education
UN resolution on Women, Peace and Security (1325) provides opportunities to guide and coordinate efforts to counter and prevent female radicalization. However, the resolution does not consider the intersectionality of women; hence it needs to be "unpacked" and contextualized for Bangladesh.
We must support isolated women at risk, facilitate social interaction and provide access to information.
Urgent need for gender-sensitive deradicalization and criminal justice response
The conference included presentations from the Centre for Genocide Studies, UNDP, Center of Peace and Justice, UN Women, UNOCT and UNODC.
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Story
27 January 2022
Mobilizing Private Sector Investment towards SDG Financing
In December 2021 a 2-day technical consultation workshop titled “Mobilizing Private Sector Investment in the SDGs through Bankable and Investable Projects” was organized by LightCastle Partners (12 & 13 December 2021) as part of the ongoing study “Private Sectors’ Role in Designing and Identifying Bankable Projects in SDG Focus Areas” commissioned by the International Labour Organization (ILO) in Bangladesh.
The study is a part of the UN Joint Program, Integrated National Financing Framework for Accelerating Achievements of SDGs (INFF4SDGs) in Bangladesh, implemented by UNDP, UNCDF, ILO, and UN Women. ILO leads the private sector engagement component of INFF4SDGs, and LightCastle Partners is working as the primary consultant of the study. The two-day virtual event covered different aspects of bankable project designing and policy environment to facilitate private investment in SDGs.
On the first day representatives from eight private sector enterprises joined UN agencies (UNDP, ILO, UNCDF) along with LightCastle Partners. After arriving at a shared understanding of basic concepts, the group discussed the factors that contribute to bankability of an investment project for SDGs. The need to incorporate impact management in terms of social and environmental returns while defining and measuring project bankability was highlighted. Organizational credibility, sector-wise prospects and available workforce topped the checklist when designing bankable projects, while the need for further engagement and policy interventions from the government, facilitating private sector investment in the SDGs, (local and foreign investors) was stressed upon.
The second day’s (13th December 2021) discussion was with the Financial Institutions in Bangladesh. Financial returns and profitability are the first priorities when it comes to project bankability for private investors, however, the social and environmental impact are also essential for sustainable growth. Organizational credibility, early-stage planning, and political environment were considered top essentials, when investing in bankable projects. The common ground remained the need for further engagement and policy interventions from the government, facilitating private sector investment in the SDGs.
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Story
29 November 2021
Crop diversification for Bangladeshi farmers boosts climate resilience and profits
In Bangladesh, rice is a staple food and the country’s biggest crop. Yet smallholders, who only grow this traditional crop, typically earn a meagre and intermittent income. Worsening conditions, many of which are being exacerbated by climate change, are making rice cultivation even more difficult.
The Smallholder Agriculture Competitiveness Project (SACP) works to increase farmers’ incomes and contribute to food and nutrition security by supporting smallholders become more responsive and competitive in producing diverse, high-value crops and marketing fresh and processed agricultural products. The project, which is implemented by the Ministry of Agriculture, is jointly financed by the Government of Bangladesh and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), with technical assistance from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
Mohammad Abul Kalam is one farmer, who has benefitted from the project. The 58-year-old lives in Patuakhali, a coastal district which is vulnerable to cyclones, floods, droughts, soil salinity, and soil erosion. Rice is still by far the most popular crop among the farmers there but for the farmers who do want to try something new, lack of information and resources are major barriers.
The project provided him with inputs, technology, and technical advice on how to grow vegetables better in order to generate higher returns. He was also taught how to train other farmers. He was advised to grow bottle gourd, bitter gourd, cauliflowers, and tomatoes, as market research indicated high demand for these vegetables. Through hands-on training, he learnt optimal sowing and harvesting times of these crops, greatly increasing his yields and profitablilty.
Crop diversification – the addition of new crops or cropping systems to agricultural production on a farm – is often promoted as a strategy to achieve climate resilience. By diversifying, farmers increase the range of potential food and income sources available to them. The most commonly observed barriers to crop diversification include limited output and input market development, and insufficient extension support for non-staple food crops.
Kalam is passionate about working the land and is keen to share is knowledge and experience, believing that this sharing everyone benefits. “The land I work on is mine, but I believe the entire village is mine too. All land, even barren or marginal areas, should be taken good care of. By opening up to new knowledge and innovation, we can collectively manage natural resources and produce more crops of good quality and in good quantity, which will bring the fruit of success,” he said.
Recognizing his potential, Kalam was selected as one of the lead farmers in his sub-district or upazila. Kalam now passes on his expertise to other farmers on skills such as land preparation, sowing, fertilization and pest control.
He said: “I had a cauliflower demonstration plot last year, when there was a very good harvest. I sold produce worth BDT 550,000 (US$6,480) and made a remarkable profit. This year, I’m harvesting bitter gourd from the same land supported by the project.” He added: “The government agriculture office in my upazila has been a great support for farmers like me who wanted to modernize their cropping patterns. Now I see that almost half of the farmers from my village want to grow various vegetables throughout the year”.
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Press Release
17 July 2022
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’s Message on World Youth Skills Day 15 July 2022
Today, we highlight the importance of transforming youth skills for the future of work.
Young people are disproportionately impacted by interlinked global crises, from climate change to conflicts to persistent poverty. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated these fragilities. In 2020 alone, youth employment fell by 39 million. Today, 24 million young people remain at risk of not returning to school.
The pandemic also accelerated the transformation of the labour market, adding uncertainty and widening the digital divide. We must ensure the right of young people to effective and inclusive education, training, and lifelong learning. That requires ramping up youth skills development, while investing in Technical Vocational Education and Training, broadband connectivity, and digital skills.
That is why I will convene a Transforming Education Summit in September that will bring together world leaders, youth and other education actors. Young people are drivers of change and must be fully engaged in decisions affecting their future. Guided by the United Nations Youth 2030 strategy, I urge everyone to act for youth skills development as a priority, at the Summit and beyond.
Together, let us build a more just and thriving workforce, rescue the Sustainable Development Goals and leave no one behind.
I wish you a happy World Youth Skills Day.
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Press Release
14 July 2022
Further USD 5 Million Flash Flood Relief for Bangladesh announced by UN
After a coordinated appeal by the UN country team in Bangladesh, Martin Griffiths, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, announced the allocation of USD 5 Million for Flash Flood Relief.
Over 7.2 million people have been affected by recent floods in the North East of the country and over half of those affected need humanitarian assistance.
The funding comes from the UN Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF), which aims to kick-start relief efforts in a coordinated and prioritized manner when a new crisis emerges. The focus of the CERF rapid response request is the provision high-impact immediate life-saving assistance to those most impacted and most vulnerable households.
The UN Resident Coordinator in Bangladesh Gwyn Lewis, spoke of how sobering her recent visit to the flood affected areas had been: “The scale of the floods in the region are more dramatic than any that have been experienced in recent memory. Many families have literally lost everything they own. Many are still living in shelters: the floods waters are receding very slowly and their homes are completely destroyed. There is an urgent need to scale up our support to the Government’s emergency response.”
This brings the current funding of the Humanitarian Response Plan to USD 12 Million (112 crore), which is approximatively 20% of the necessary USD 58.4 million that were identified.
The Humanitarian Response Plan prioritizes life-saving assistance including emergency food security assistance water and sanitation interventions and protection interventions targeting women and girls.
The UN is supporting the Government and delivering food assistance, drinking water, cash, emergency drugs, water purification tablets, dignity and hygiene kits to the affected families and education support.
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has provided aid — including water, nutrition and protection services — to nearly 1 million people. WFP has distributed 85 metric tons of fortified biscuits to 34,000 households, while the World Health Organization (WHO) has provided 250,000 water purification tablets. For its part, the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) has helped pregnant women to access hospitals and positioned midwives to provide emergency obstetric support. The WHO provided 250,000 water purification tablets to the affected people. 13.5 million Aquatabs and some 220,000 medical items were donated by UNHCR. IOM also provided 6 million Aquatabs and 6000 jerrycans, and provided a 8,233 sets of tarpaulin sheets and ropes. Key national and international NGOs are providing vital emergency response in the most-affected areas, including provision of critical cash assistance, safe drinking water, shelter, and emergency sanitation under the Government’s leadership.
___________________________________
For media query, please contact:
Mohammad Moniruzzaman (PhD
National Information Officer, UN Information Centre
Mobile: 01716302568, Email: moniruzzamanm@un.org
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Press Release
07 July 2022
Joint Press Statement on Flash Flood - July 2022
An estimated 7.2 million people have been severely affected following devastating flash floods which began in May 2022 with a second wave starting around the 15 June 2022 in nine northeastern districts of Bangladesh: Sylhet, Sunamganj, Moulvibazar, Habiganj, Kishorganj, Netrakona, Brahmanbaria, Mymensing and Sherpur. Among the nine districts, the five districts that are most heavily impacted are Sylhet, Sunamganj, Moulivazar, Habiganj and Netrakona.
On 2-3 July 2022 a joint mission of the United Nations, humanitarian donors (European Union, United Kingdom) and NGO partners visited the flood-affected districts of Sylhet and Sunamganj. The mission aimed to see the impact of and response to the floods, express its solidarity with those affected and offer condolences.
The mission was able to see the extent of the flooding, to hear from some of the people affected, speak with key local authorities delivering the Government’s response, and get a glimpse into the scale and scope of the response provided by the Government and complemented by UN agencies and NGOs. There is a large-scale coordinated response operation ongoing under the Government’s strong leadership. The Government has moved over 472,000 people to some 1,605 shelter centres. Many of the most vulnerable people within the communities that we spoke to have received vital food assistance.
The UN and NGO partners are supporting these efforts by delivering food assistance, drinking water, cash, emergency drugs, water purification tablets, dignity and hygiene kits and education support to the affected families.
UNICEF is on the ground to protect children and to deliver safe water, nutrition and health services and supplies. UNICEF re-allocated $2.8 million of internal resources to meet the emergency needs and has provided life-saving support to nearly one million people. WFP distributed 85 tons of fortified biscuits to 34,000 households in three districts. UNFPA has provided referral support for pregnant women to access hospitals and positioned midwives to provide 24/7 emergency obstetric support. UNFPA is also operating maternity waiting homes for pregnant women while they wait for institutional delivery. The WHO provided 250,000 water purification tablets to the affected people. Key national and international NGOs are providing vital emergency response in the most-affected areas, including provision of critical cash assistance, safe drinking water, shelter, and emergency sanitation under the Government’s leadership. The Government has announced welcome additional support.
Despite these efforts, and due to the scale of the floods, there are areas that are still inaccessible – cut off from rescue or relief. Many of the elders in the communities described this flood as worse than any that they have seen in their lifetimes. Those that have made it to the shelters as the flood waters rose, often had to pay exorbitant amounts to private boat owners, depleting savings that are now badly needed to meet basic needs. The shelters themselves remain overcrowded given the inability of most people to return home because the flood waters are receding so slowly and damage to homes is so widespread. This has resulted in a lack of space and privacy which leaves women, girls and children particularly vulnerable. In addition, some 60,000 women in the affected areas are pregnant. Of them, some 6,500 will give birth in the next month. With primary healthcare centres submerged and non-functional, most of these women have limited or no access to healthcare.
Where water has receded somewhat, more families will return to damaged homes, other will have to rebuild from scratch. Damaged latrines and water sources will also need to be repaired. Children have lost three weeks of schooling already and their books have gotten washed away. This comes on top of the loss of schooling due to the COVID-related school closures in 2020-2021.
The mission had the opportunity to discuss the visit with the Honorable Secretary of the Bangladesh Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief, Mr. Md. Kamrul Hasan on Wednesday 6 July. It welcomes the Government of Bangladesh’s strong leadership on this issue and its plans to prepare and respond, should further flooding take place.
In the face of ongoing needs and to complement the Government of Bangladesh’s ongoing efforts, the European Union allocated €1.2 million (over BDT 11.7 crore) to humanitarian NGOs and €200,000 (over BDT 1.9 crore) through the Bangladesh Red Crescent Society, the UK Government released £636,548 (over BDT 7 crore), Sweden committed 13 million SEK (over BDT 12 crore), and the United States Government through the U.S. Agency for International Development allocated $250,000 (over BDT 2.3 crore) in emergency funding.
The Humanitarian Response Plan appeals for USD58.4 million to provide essential needs for over 1.5 million targeted people in five heavily impacted districts of Sunamganj, Netrokona, Sylhet, Habiganj and Moulvibazar. As this is the beginning of the rainy season, there is an urgent need to scale up support to complement the Government’s lead role.
Gwyn Lewis
UN Resident Coordinator
Matt Cannell
Development Director, British High Commission
Isabelle D’Haudt
Acting Head of EU Humanitarian Aid Office in Bangladesh
Gwyn Lewis
UN Resident Coordinator
Matt Cannell
Development Director, British High Commission
Isabelle D’Haudt
Acting Head of EU Humanitarian Aid Office in Bangladesh
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Press Release
03 July 2022
Executive Board of UNDP, UNFPA & UNOPS visits Bangladesh
A high-level delegation of the Executive Board of UNDP, UNFPA and UNOPS visited Bangladesh on a week-long mission to see the projects implemented by the UN and met the government.
Led by the board’s president, Ambassador and Permanent Representative of the Kingdom of The Netherlands to the UN (Head of Delegation), H.E. Ms. Yoka Brandt, the mission arrived in Dhaka on June 25 and left on 01 July.
Brandt was accompanied by Ambassadors and Permanent Representatives of Guatemala, Sweden, and Bulgaria to the UN, respectively H.E. Mr. Luis Antonio Lam Padilla, H.E. Ms. Anna Karin Eneström and H.E. Ms. Lachezara Stoeva; Ambassador and Deputy Permanent Representative of Kenya to the UN H.E. Ms. Njambi Kinyungu; International Aid Researcher at Qatar Fund for Development (QFFD) Mashael Muftah; Deputy Secretary of the Executive Board, Dalita Balassanian, Chief of the UNFPA Executive Board Branch, Samuel Choritz; and the Head of the UNOPS New York Board and External Relations Office, William Axelsson.
The mission kicked off with a meeting with the UN Bangladesh Country Team headed by the UN Resident Coordinator, Gwyn Lewis.
They also visited the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and Ministry of Foreign Affairs on the second day before flying off to Cox’s Bazar to see project activities.
“UN has a strong relationship with the Government of Bangladesh, and we want to further build on that to facilitate the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. We are here to see how we can work together more efficiently to that end, especially as the country is poised for LDC graduation,” said Brandt.
“The UN has been a strong development partner for Bangladesh, and this mission is giving us the scope to review and evaluate areas that need to be focused,” Foreign Secretary, Masud Bin Momen, said during the visit.
“It is a very timely visit. The UN has been a partner of the Government and the people of Bangladesh since 1971, and this mission will allow us to take stock of where we stand and guide our future interventions,” UN Resident Coordinator Gwyn Lewis added.
The mission visited UNDP’s Solid Waste Management and Disaster Risk Management activities, UNFPA Women Friendly Space/Women-led Community Centers, and a Health Clinic implemented by UNOPS in the Rohingya camp; learned about a joint UN inter-agency initiative on Sustainable Development Goal localisation; and met with district representatives and Refugee, Relief and Repatriation Commissioner (RRRC).
They also observed the UNDP’s District Development Plan initiative and Climate Displaced Communities; and the Health and Gender Support joint programme of UNFPA and other agencies in Cox’s Bazar.
Following their return to Dhaka, the delegation visited the Directorate General of Drug Administration to see UNOPS activities and attended several meetings with the Economic Relations Division (ERD) of the Ministry of Finance, the Local Government Division, Ministry of Disaster Management & Relief, Forest, Environment and Climate Change, and Ministry of Foreign Affairs. They also learned about UNDP’s Aspire to Innovate (A2I) programme and how it’s supporting the country to make Bangladesh more digital. The delegation also visited the National Resilience Programme (NRP), a partnership with the Government of Bangladesh and UNDP, UNOPS and UN Women and visited urban slums, which demonstrated a UNFPA-WFP joint programme on menstrual health and hygiene support for adolescent girls and the joint UNDP and UNV National Urban Poverty Reduction Programme.
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UNDP is the leading United Nations organisation fighting to end the injustice of poverty, inequality, and climate change. Working with our broad network of experts and partners in 170 countries, we help nations to build integrated, lasting solutions for people and the planet.
For more information and media interviews, contact: Md Abdul Quayyum, Head of Communications, UNDP Bangladesh: md.quayyum@undp.org, +8801715025551 Dalita Balassanian, Deputy Secretary of the Executive Board, UNDP NY, dalita.balassanian@undp.org, +12129066564
For more information and media interviews, contact: Md Abdul Quayyum, Head of Communications, UNDP Bangladesh: md.quayyum@undp.org, +8801715025551 Dalita Balassanian, Deputy Secretary of the Executive Board, UNDP NY, dalita.balassanian@undp.org, +12129066564
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Press Release
26 June 2022
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’s Message on the International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking
This year’s International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking shines a spotlight on the impact of drug challenges in health and humanitarian crises.
Conflicts, climate disasters, forced displacement and grinding poverty create fertile ground for drug abuse — with COVID-19 making a bad situation even worse. At the same time, people living through humanitarian emergencies are far less likely to have access to the care and treatment they need and deserve.
Meanwhile, criminals are profiting from people’s misery, with cocaine production at record highs, and a five-fold increase in seizures of methamphetamines and a near-quadrupling of amphetamine seizures over the last decade.
On this International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking, we renew our commitment to ending this scourge and supporting those who fall victim to it.
This includes non-discriminatory policy solutions centred around people, health and human rights, underpinned by strengthened international cooperation to curb the illicit drug trade and hold accountable those who profit from human misery.
We must also strengthen science-based treatment and support services for drug users, and treat them as victims who need treatment rather than punishment, discrimination and stigma — including treatment for those living with infectious diseases like HIV/AIDS and hepatitis.
We cannot allow the world’s drug problem to further shadow the lives of the tens of millions of people living through humanitarian crises.
On this important day, let us commit to lifting this shadow once and for all, and giving this issue the attention and action it deserves.
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