PKSF Managing Director Dr Nomita Halder, ndc, undertook a five-day visit in Bagerhat, Khulna and Satkhira districts to inspect various field activities being implemented under different PKSF projects and programmes aimed at improving the lives and livelihoods of the disadvantaged people in rural Bangladesh.
During the the 26-30 December 2021 tour, she visited activities of PKSF’s Agriculture Unit, LIFT, Prosperity project and SEP project being implemented with financial and technical support form PKSF.
Prosperity Project Director and PKSF General Manager Dr Sharif Ahmed Chowdhury and General Manager Dr AKM Nuruzzaman accompanied the MD during the visit.
Launched in 2019, Prosperity is delivering a wide range of livelihoods, nutrition and community mobilisation support to extremely poor households in nearly 150 selected unions of three climate-vulnerable regions.
Dr Halder visited a range of farm and off-farm activities of the project, including goat and sheep rearing, fish culture, chicken and duck rearing, homestead gardening, tailoring training, and fishing gear and mat making. She also visited various platforms formed under the project, including Prosperity Village Committee (PVC), Mother and Child Forum, and Adolescent Girls Club where she learned about the challenges the local communities face.
During the visit, she unveiled the foundation plaques of two Reverse Osmosis water plants in Khulna and Satkhira where potable water is scarce due to salinity. She also distributed rainwater harvesting tanks among Prosperity members who face acute shortage of potable water, also due to salinity.
She distributed assistive devices like wheelchairs, crutches and hearing aids to persons with disabilities, who are often excluded from mainstream growth and job.
The PKSF team inspected a range of interventions of PKSF’s Agriculture Unit that include Summer Tomato cultivation, safe vegetable cultivation using pheromone trap, ornamental fish and bird farming.
PKSF Managing Director visited a semi-intensive sheep breeding farm and a Reverse Osmosis water plant funded by LIFT, which is a core PKSF programme. She inspected dairy clusters, milk value chain activities, vermicompost production and other activities under the LIFT programme and SEP project.
Expressing her satisfaction at PKSF’s field activities in remote areas, Dr Halder stressed the need for making PKSF services even more accessible to marginalised and vulnerable sections of the society.
