Ensuring access to safety net for labour-poor households

The Bangladesh government implements a number of social safety net programmes to ensure food security in labour-constraint households, i.e., households having persons with disability, widow and elderly people. 

All eligible Bangladeshi nationals can apply for inclusion in the programmes at a certain time every year. This year, the government has set August 31 for online registration for widow and elderly people’s allowance.  

However, many eligible people in the Prosperity project’s 145 working unions in 12 poverty-prone districts are unaware of the benefit. Others are unable to register for a lack of access to phone or computer. PPEPP’s household survey on 2.5 lakh extreme poor households shows that more than half of these labour-constraint households are out of the coverage of safety net schemes.  

To support people like them, Prosperity project works closely with local government institutions to make sure that all eligible elderly and women receive the safety net allowance. 

At the participant and larger community level, project officials collect the necessary documents, including their national ID cards, and have their name registered online. 

Subsequently, officials of the partner organisations engage with the relevant government departments during linkage meetings to facilitate speedy inclusion of the project participants in the safety net programmes.

Since launching of the project in 2019, PO staff attended in nearly 400 linkage meetings on various issues, including safety net coverage for the EP HHs. So far, more than 1,000 extreme poor people have been facilitated to have access to government safety net programmes. They include persons with disability, elderly people, widows, and ethnic minority people.