BRAC BLOG

• World’s Indigenous Peoples Day: Celebrating diversity through stories

  08/08/2019

  The land of black and white parrots Paibung was a little girl whose parents were jhum (slash and burn agriculture) farmers. One day, before going to work, Paibung’s parents asked her to look after the sesame seeds which were drying under the sun in their yard. Suddenly, a flock of black and white parrots came and asked Paibung for some sesame s… Read more

• Why learning should begin in your own language

  08/08/2019

  Research shows that a child’s first language is the optimal language for learning throughout primary school years, and that children are more likely to drop out or fall behind in school if the language of instruction is not their first language. I grew up surrounded by rolling blue-green hills in Rangamati Sadar of south-eastern Bangladesh. I sti… Read more

• Combatting the world’s fastest growing crime

  30/07/2019

  Shahinur* was left destitute when her husband was injured in a car accident. A recruiting agency offered her a stable job in Libya and she accepted. Shahinur found herself in Syria, instead of Libya, in a brothel, instead of an office. She was raped, beaten and tortured, for months. Like the majority of women migrant workers from Bangladesh seeking… Read more

• How Liberia’s bushlands got a lush, green makeover

  28/07/2019

  We can all learn something from the past. The interventions the U.S. carried out during the Great Depression taught us that targeting the agriculture-oriented areas can be a beacon for financial stability in hard times. Cash for work is an underrated treatment that has been practiced in various nuances during the times of financial crises and nutri… Read more

• Are Bangladesh’s youth ready for the 21st century?

  25/07/2019

  It is a fact widely understood now that Bangladesh is facing a unique situation that comes virtually once in a few centuries, and that too only to a few countries: the “working age population” of Bangladesh is now significantly larger than the “non-working age population.” What this implies is that most people in Bangladesh… Read more