Microfinance Programme:

Goal of the program is to poverty alleviation and empowerment of the poor through providing self-employment. Micro-finance is a tool in the fight against poverty. It enables small entrepreneurs, who are excluded of classic banking system, to get loan in order to develop business.  Its impact is many folds i.e increased stable income, reduced vulnerability to external shocks, progression from the informal economy to the formal economy and improving living conditions, improved education and health care. 

Microcredit Program is the core program of the organization. It is based on integrated development approach designed to address the needs of the target groups giving emphasis on underprivileged folks including hardcore poor women and asset-less people of rural and urban areas. During the reporting period of 2018-2019 credit program of SEHEO attempted to attain the following broad objectives:

 

• To make credit available to the poor and helpless people who do not have access to existing formal credit facilities.
• Help creating self-employment and sustainable income for the poor.
• Mobilize savings for the poor as old age security.
• Reduce dependency on moneylenders.

SEHEO has been operating the Microcredit Program with its own and external fund since its inception. This program has been able bring a total of 1,31,712 members under credit services. Credit support was given to the beneficiaries in the sectors such as agriculture, flowers cultivation, poultry& livestock, dairy, beef fattening, fisheries and handicrafts. SEHEO provide four types of credit to its client i.e Rural Micro-credit, SME loan for Women entrepreneurs, Housing loan and special loan for agriculture. Apart from it also provide seasonal loan to meet demand of agricultural production. 

1. Rural Micro-credit Program (RMC):

Rural microcredit is provided to the poor especially women organizing in group in village level. Village wise groups are formed with the poor people, finding out through a base line survey. The group usually comprise of 20 – 30 group members. Every group has its own group leader’s i.e chairperson, secretary, cashier and general members. Group sits in every week for depositing savings, loan installment repayments and making scheme for new loan, to be provided to group members. Field officer/loan officer organize the group and facilitate operation of the individual group. RMC is a group oriented savings and credit group activity. The group itself is responsible for loan disbursement and loan recovery.  The loan provided in RMC in the trade such as  spices production, vegetable cultivation, oil seed production, maize cultivation, flower cultivation , vegetable cultivation, livestock rearing, fish culture, beef fattening, small trading etc.. Usually the loan ranges from Tk. 10,000/- to Tk.  30,000/-. The beneficiaries repay loan in weekly installment. Lion part of the loan goes to agricultural sector.  During the reporting period Tk. 7422.20 Lac has been disbursed to 43660 members as RMC. Cumulative disbursement, from inception till to date, Tk. 35158.73 Lac has been disbursed as RMC. Recovery rate of the loan is about 99.72%.

 

 

2. SME Loan Program:

This loan is provided to create micro entrepreneurs for individual members. Usually, successfully graduated RMC borrowers are entitled to get SME loan. Though, skill individual can get SME loan too. SEHEO categorizes any loan as SME loan when it exceed Taka 30,000/- (Taka Thirty Thousand). This loan may go to both agriculture and non-agriculture sectors. Most of the loan has gone to trade like Weaving facory, Handicrfts, Fisheries & Cow Fattening. Up to date Tk. 18780.55 Lac has been disbursed to borrowers as SME loan. During the reporting period Tk. 4117.27 Lac has been disbursed to 9,789 entrepreneurs.

3. Housing Loan Program:

The Bangladesh Government is committed to provide every household a house to live in. Being a loan provider SEHEO had the opportunity to facilitate the initiative of Govt. SEHEO receive a soft loan from Bangladesh Bank for providing house building assistance to its beneficiaries. The loan is of long term. The beneficiaries take the loan to build their house and pay it in installment for a tenure of 10 years. The low cost house is made at a prescribed design, provided by SEHEO approved by the Bangladesh Bank.  The program has come to as a gift for the low income family’s i.e poor families. SEHEO has been disbursing loan to build low cost house for about 10 years. Till to date SEHEO has disbursed a total of Tk. 91, 52,500/- among 233 beneficiaries.

 

4. Agriculture Sector Micro-credit:

Agriculture Sector Micro Credit Program is a special loan for the beneficiaries. The agricultural loan is provided to its beneficiaries to meet seasonal demand of loan to farmers. The loan goes to the trade like vegetable cultivation, maize cultivation, spices production, oil seed cultivation, flower cultivation, beef fattening etc. The loan is provided at the same interest rate but duration is about 6 months/1 year. The farmers repay the loan at a time after harvesting their produces.  Any farmers can get the loan apart from RMC. During reporting period Tk. 10404.36 Lac has been disbursed to 57,802 farmers.  The seasonal loan has become a fortune for the beneficiaries because they do not have to think about money for their agricultural production, when they need it.

 

Training Program:

Capacity building training of Staff:

For effective running of a program, capacity development of a staff is a must. Keeping it in mind SEHEO has taken initiative to enhance capacity of staff by providing capacity building training. The Accounts Officers were taught about keeping books of accounts efficiently, office management and computing to help maintaining books of accounts properly. The mangers and field staff have been taught how to form group, credit and savings management, supervision, monitoring and evaluation.  Both internal and external resource persons were hired to train up the staff.

This has stressed upon promoting professional skill and knowledge of staff members and volunteers directly involved in credit operation. A total of 155 managerial staff, 746 filed level staff and 450 volunteers have received theoretical and practical training provided by Microcredit Development & Research Unit of SEHEO. The following table illustrate statistic of training provided to the officer of SEHEO.

SL. No	Name of Training	Type of Participant	Year wise (5 Years) Number of Participant
			2014-2015	2015-2016	2016-2017	2017-2018	2018-2019
01	Agri/Microcredit Management	Zonal Manager, Area Branch, Manager, Managers & Field Officers	250	390	430	720	955
02	Savings Management	Area Manager, Branch Managers, Branch Accountants  & Field Officer	80	185	200	360	515
03	Women Entrepreneur/ SME Project Development	Zonal Manager, Area Manager, Branch Managers & Field Officers	110	375	451	480	570
04	Group Approach	Branch Accountants , Field officer	110	210	220	360	520
05	Accounting	Branch Accountants, Asst. Branch Accountants	35	135	160	310	435
07	Office Management	Head Office Staff/Project Office Staff	20	90	140	320	410
08	Monitoring & Evaluation	Monitoring  Officer, Audit Officer	25	110	135	210	290
09	Computer & Software Operation	Zonal Manager, Area Manager , Branch Manager, Accountants , IT Officer & Field Officers	130	352	420	610	745
Total			760	1847	2156	3370	4440
Grand Total			12573

 

Training for Beneficiaries:

Leadership Development Training:

SEHEO implement its program/Projects on Group Approach. Group leaders are supposed to maintain the groups. That includes attendance of group members, maintaining small group, selection of small group leaders, savings collection, 100% loan installment collection, scheme preparation in weekly meeting, loan disbursement. Thus they have to perform a series of group works. To equip the group leader, it needs to train them up. In this point of view, SEHEO provide the leaders with leadership development training. Till to date, SEHEO imparted training to 140 batches of training with 730 group leaders. The training has an immense impact on discipline of group and thus the group of SEHEO is in good shape to run credit and other social development activities.

  

Skill Development Training:

Vocational training aimed at transferring viable vocational skills to beneficiaries for fostering their self-employment combining skills and credit support. Major components of career training included seasonal crops cultivation, vegetables cultivation, cow fattening, dairy management, fish culture, poultry management, handicrafts making and environment management.  The following table illustrate sector-wise agricultural training recipient:

SL. No	Name of Training	Type Participant	5 Years Number of Participant
			2014-2015	2015-2016	2016-2017	2017-2018	2018-2019
01	Seasonal Crops Cultivation	Farmers	5550	8550	10340	19990	20876
02	Vegetables Cultivation	Farmers	2550	4860	12985	38550	39745
03	Flower Cultivation	Farmers	2650	3560	6860	23860	25210
04	Mize and Spice Cultivation	Farmers	175	175	7325	11555	11930
05	Beef Fattening	Beneficiaries	255	780	5890	8985	10165
06	Cow rearing	Beneficiaries	165	590	1055	2485	3740
07	Fish Culture	Beneficiaries	555	620	2030	6990	7575
08	Poultry  rearing	Beneficiaries	76	560	1380	1765	2840
09	Goats & Sheep rearing	Beneficiaries	675	2020	3086	9588	9631
Total			12651	21715	50951	123768	131712
Grand Total			340797

 

Off-Firm Skill Development Training:

SEHEO has a unit of skill development training, off-firm, in place. To facilitate self-employment of beneficiaries the trainings are being provided. The trades are taught such as tailoring, computer training, embroidery & handicraft, house wiring etc. Through the program the beneficiaries are taught in theoretical and practical lesson to equip them in a particular trade. Then the beneficiaries are provided with loan to purchase machine, raw materials to start their business. Up to date 24939 beneficiaries were provided with those training. During the reporting period 8977 beneficiaries were imparted training on the above trades. The following table illustrates trade-wise training of Consecutive 5 years provided to the beneficiaries.

 

SL. No	Name of Training	5 Years Number of Participant
		2014-2015	2015-2016	2016-2017	2017-2018	2018-2019
01	Tailoring	750	1020	1870	2720	2952
02	Computer Training	120	210	490	850	1245
03	Handicrafts crafts	650	1080	2420	3650	4720
04	House Wring	21	29	37	45	60
Total		1541	2339	4817	7265	8977
Grand Total		24939

 

Delivery of High Zinc Rice in Bangladesh Program:

Many people in developing countries like Bangladesh depend on rice for their vitamin and minerals intake but rice does not normally have zinc, along with iron and vitamin A, which is vital for children. In Bangladesh over 44% of under 5 age children suffers from zinc-deficiency, with 40% having stunted growth.  Thus, it necessitates cultivating zinc-enriching rice and making it popular in Bangladesh.  SEHEO implemented High Zinc Rice cultivation in Bangladesh to ensure faster breeding of Zinc enrich Rice in Bangladesh. Best quality seeds of BRRI dhan 62, BRRI dhan 72 & BRRI dhan 74 variety among them to cultivation of high-yielding, zinc-enriched and disease and pest resistant rice variety. It is noteworthy to state that SEHEO has been cultivating the rice for about previous 6 years

 Home-stead Tree plantation:

Environment degradation is a major threat to subsistence. Climate change has become talk of the universe now days. Carbon emission that causes climate change has to be cut down. Only the way that can reduce carbon emission is tree plantation. Under this program, group members and other people of the project villages were made aware of environment degradation & pollution, and its protection. During the reporting period of 2018 -2019, 31,350 saplings, both timber and fruit trees, were distributed among 2750 group members in 90 program villages. Sapling was collected from Government and private Nurseries. The beneficiaries who got the saplings provided a one-day orientation how to plant saplings and care of it. The saplings were distributed to plant it in their respective home-stead. This program was implemented with the support of SEHEO & Department of Forest and Environment of Bangladesh Govt.

Details of Tree Plantation Program:

Years	No. of Beneficiaries	Distribution of free seedlings
2015	1475	67250
2016	1680	76500
2017	1520	85900
2018	1230	12500
2019	1750	18850
Total	7655	261000

 

Fisheries Program:

Fisheries program of SEHEO has become one of the most effective programs over the last 6 years in terms of poverty reduction, nutrition and food security.  Through the program the beneficiaries are provided with training and technical support. Personnel from local fisheries office and our staff impart training to the beneficiaries. After completion of the training, the beneficiaries are provided with credit support for stocking fingerlings and purchasing fish feed.  Both individual and group based fish culture program is in place. In group based fisheries program, a group of fishermen hire a pond to cultivate fish. The members of the group contribute equally in the venture.  Though SEHEO give loan to individual fisherman but the money goes to group fish culture. So far, 50 groups, comprising 256 group members, have been formed to lease out 50 pond, with about 40.0 acres of water body. After harvesting, the beneficiaries share profit equally. Besides, individual fishermen are also covered by the program. They are also provided with training and credit support for the purpose. At present, there are about 18535 individual house-holds and total 382.50 acre of water body under the program. The following table represents the status of the program.

  

Years	No. of Beneficiaries	Total water body
2015	4280	109. acre
2016	8955	175.04 acre
2017	10540	226.0 acre
2018	14365	262.15 acre
2019	18535	382.50 acre
Total	56675	1154.69 acre

 

Mother and Child Health Care Program: Mother & Child Health Care Program of SEHEO is a regular program of the organization. During the reporting period of 2018-2019, this program has been implemented giving support for primary health care and family planning services. Major activities of this program were organizing primary health care camp and free medicine distribution, sanitation, mother and child health care etc. This year SEHEO’s Primary Health Care & Family Planning Program delivered various health and sanitation related services to 18535 beneficiaries.  This program is supported by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

 

Allowance for the poor mother during pregnancy period program:

With the financial support of department of Women and Children Affairs, SEHEO has been implementing the project for pregnant mothers for the period of 2018- 2019. The program is a part of social safety net program implemented by the government. Through the program the pregnant mothers are provided with monthly monetary allowance and provided social development training. The mothers were provided training on Personal Hygiene and Cleanliness, Safe Maternity and Pregnant Mother Care, Health & Nutrition, Gender equality and Women Empowerment, Early Marriage, Family Planning, Birth Registration, Breast-feeding, Mother & Child Care, Food & Nutrition, Disaster Management etc.. The program is being implemented in 8 unions of Harinakundo upazila, 16 union of Golapgonj upazila Under Shylet District, 10 Union of Kushtia Sador, 15 Union of Faridpur Sador  and 8 unions of Fakirhat upazila under Bagerhat district. 3-5 day long trainings were imparted to all the mothers. Last 5 years total 35500 mothers, were enrolled by the program. The following table shows year wise imparted training to the beneficiaries by the program.

 

 

Sl. No.	Name of training	2015	2016	2017	2018	2019
01	Personal hygiene and cleanliness	1775	1775	3550	3550	3550
02	Safe maternity and pregnant mother care	1775	1775	3550	3550	3550
03	Health & nutrition,	1775	1775	3550	3550	3550
04	Gender equality and women empowerment	1775	1775	3550	3550	3550
05	Early marriage prevention	1775	1775	3550	3550	3550
06	Family planning,	1775	1775	3550	3550	3550
07	Birth registration	1775	1775	3550	3550	3550
08	Breast-feeding Mother & Child care	1775	1775	3550	3550	3550
09	Food & Nutrition	1775	1775	3550	3550	3550
10	Disaster management	1775	1775	3550	3550	3550
Total Beneficiaries		35500

 

Safe Water and Sanitation Program:

Healthy society and sustainable environment is the prerequisite for sustainable socio-economic development of a nation. But national development is obstructed because of the 25% population of Bangladesh still are out of standard sanitation and safe water facilities. Due to scarcity of safe water people have to suffer a lot. Consumption of unsafe drinking water leads to water borne diseases that claim many lives particularly of children. Frequent ailments also lessen annual working hour of people.  According to the Govt. information 75% family of our country use hygienic sanitary latrine; 20% use unhygienic latrine and remaining 5% defecate at open places. Considering the terrible situation, Bangladesh Govt. has determined to ensure sanitation facility for all.  In this context, SEHEO has been implementing safe water and sanitation program at 11 upazilas of 06 districts. SEHEO conducted awareness program about the necessity of safe water and hygienic sanitary latrine organizing rally, small group discussion (court yard meeting), distributing poster and leaflets and organizing WATSAN FAIR as soft-ware support. During the reporting period, in terms of hard ware support, SEHEO distributed 10 tube-wells and 932 ring slabs among its beneficiaries. The following table shows year on year beneficiaries covered by the program.

Status of activities done in the sector of Water & Sanitation:

Years	Village	No. of Beneficiaries
2015	310	1124
2016	330	1710
2017	380	2295
2018	860	3160
2019	1245	6225
Total	3125	14514

 

Child Education Program:

 

Pre-primary Education:

 

Education is the back bone of a nation. Though literacy rate is increasing but still quality of education is a matter of concern in our country. About half of the children drop out from school even completing five grade of education. The cause is nothing but our parents in rural settings are not educated and lack of motivation. Thus, we have to start from the very begging of education of a child. The children should be made physically, mentally and psychologically prepared for going to school. In this context, SEHEO initiated pre-primary education for minor children of 4-5 age group. Through this initiative, an education center is opened in cluster village to accommodate 25-30 children in it. The center is for 1 year term. The children are taught elementary education that is introduction of alphabets, simple math like counting etc. The children are enrolled in the center for 1 year. After completion of 1 year of education they are facilitated to get admission into nearby govt. primary school. Apart from, the parents of the children are motivated to send their children at school and made aware of other social issues like early marriage, necessity of education, safe water and sanitation etc. SEHEO has been running the program with the technical and material support from CAMPE, Dhaka and SEHEO. Up to date 450 children were imparted pre-primary education and were facilitated to get admission into govt. primary school nearby. 

 

Disability Development Program:

About 10% of our total population is disabled. This is, actually, a hug population. Thus, we cannot imagine development of our country excluding that huge population. In this very context SEHEO has undertaken the disabled development program. Bangladesh Protibandhi Unnayan SEHEO, one of the govt. organizations, is specially engaged in mainstreaming disabled people in development. SEHEO has managed to become the partner for this endeavor and running the disabled development program with their technical and financial assistance. IGA training, awareness raising on their rights, providing assistive devices, education support was provided by SEHEO. Micro-credit support is also given to them from SEHEO.  The following table shows last year on year support given to them.

 

  

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Prevention of Women & Child Trafficking Program: 

Bangladesh is one of the most vulnerable countries for trafficking in person because of its large population, large scale of rural urban migration and large number of population living in abject poverty, natural disaster and gender inequality. During distressed situation, like river erosion, flood, etc. lack of shelter for girls and their security are the great problem. All these sectors make people vulnerable and easy target for traffickers. Moreover, existing patrilineal / patriarchal family system of Bangladesh are making women and children vulnerable to trafficking to a great extent.  Besides, there are some other identified causes of trafficking that includes: (i) feminization of poverty, (ii) increased insecurity of basic needs and civic facilities, (iii) separation and divorce of women (iv) increased number of street and working children (v) natural disaster and displacement (vi) false hope of employment and marriage (vii) organized crime syndicate (viii) increased level of corruption among law enforcing agencies etc.. The trafficking is a gender and age specific phenomenon i.e it affects mostly women and children. Consequently they are the victim of coercion of prostitution, forced marriage, forced work, forced begging, and organ harvesting and so on. Probability of HIV/Aids due to expansion of sex industry could not be ruled out.  

Jhenaidah, Jessore, Satkhira & Kushtia are frontier districts of Bangladesh bordering India. As a result, trafficking is a major problem here. Taking consideration of the situation, SEHEO has undertaken the anti-trafficking program. Mass awareness program, community leader meeting, meeting with law enforcement agencies, rally, seminar, door–to-door awareness campaign, legal aid support etc. are organized by the program. Besides, leaflets and posters were printed and distributed among common people and hang on different public palaces. Documentary film show was also screened in public places to make aware people of trafficking in men, women and children.

SEHEO has been running the program for about 10 years. During the reporting period, it has conducted 1345 court yard meeting, four rallies, and one seminar. Apart from, 12,000 leaflets and 6,000 poster were printed and distributed. In total about 1, 45,430 people were reached by the program.

 

Workshop on Prevention of Women and Child Trafficking:

Trafficking in men and women has become as curse to our society. Luring women for jobs with handsome salary, the traffickers send them abroad and neighboring countries.  Then they fall prey to different sorts of abuse including sexual abuses. To aware the people of the trafficking in persons SEHEO implement the program. It organized a three-day workshop on prevention on women and child trafficking at SEHEO Training Center. A total of 88 stakeholders participated in the workshop including women leaders, local public representatives, human rights activists, community leaders, journalists, teachers and SEHEO staff members. Sessions of workshops were carried out by external and internal resource persons. Sessions focused on target, routes, pattern and rings of trafficking as well as preventive measures. 

Drug abuse Prevention & Control program:

Now a day’s drug abuse has become as menace. The situation has turned so alarming that govt. has initiated a crackdown program against drug peddler. SEHEO has its own drug abuse and prevention control program. Aim of the program is to aware the students of Universities, Colleges and High Schools of the hazards of drug abuse and its adverse impacts on personal and social life. During the period, about 8,825 students of various institutions and 80730 group members were made aware of the issue through conducting group based meeting and school & college forum. In each institution, one Drug Abuse Prevention Committee was formed. This program distributed posters, leaflets and handbills among the students of target institutions and to all groups.

HIV/AIDS Prevention Program: 

Bangladesh is surrounded by India and Myanmar, two high prevalence countries on HIV/Aids. Though, still Bangladesh has low HIV/Aids prevalence but outbreak of it cannot be ruled out.  SEHEO has a program to address the issue. Through the program, it has created awareness among transport workers, factory workers and floating sex workers in Jhenaidah, Kaligonj, Benapol, Jessore, Jibonnagar, Dorsona under chuadanga district on HIV/Aids. During the reporting period of 2018-2019, the program provided seven-day long training to 3525 factory & transport workers and floating sex workers through 36 training sessions. The training sessions were arranged in the community centers, school premises and in similar venues. The content of the sessions were: 

  

 What is HIV/AIDS and STDs/STIs

• Socio-economic impacts of pandemics
• Transmission mechanisms of HIV/Aids
• Protection and prevention measures
• Role of participants preventing HIV/Aids

 FACTS ABOUT HIV/Aids PREVENTION PROGRAM: 

 

Years	Participants	No. of Participants
		Male	Female	Total
2015	Transport Workers, Truck Drivers Bus Drivers,  Riksaw Drivers Factory Worker,  Floating Sex worker	265	1550	1815
2016	Transport Workers, Truck DriversBus Drivers,  Riksaw Drivers Factory Worker, Floating Sex worker	205	820	1025
2017	Transport Workers, Truck DriversBus Drivers, Riksaw Drivers Factory Worker, Floating Sex worker	180	215	395
2018	Transport Workers, Truck DriversBus Drivers, Riksaw Drivers Factory Worker, Floating Sex worker	765	2285	3050
2019	Transport Workers, Truck DriversBus Drivers, Riksaw DriversFactory Worker, Floating Sex worker	870	2655	3525
Total		2285	7525	9810

Disaster Management & Social Responsibility Program:

Disaster Management Program of SEHEO is operated in disaster prone areas of Bangladesh. Major activities of this program, in emergency period, include emergency relief, supply of food stuff, drinking water, medication and essential drug distribution. After the disaster, as rehabilitation options support was given to repair house and livelihood support. During the reporting period, this program delivered services 9810 disaster affected people. Through this program, SEHEO trained up 150 community based disaster support activists who helped disaster victim people in emergency situation and post disaster rehabilitation.

Winter Cloths Distribution:

Due to climate change country facing drought, heavy rain fall, frequent flood, chilling cold like disaster. Though Bangladesh is graduated from least developed country to developing one, still there remain about 12% hard core poor people. The hard core poor people lack of resources and toils a lot for their subsistence. They are the people who suffer severely during those crisis period. To mitigate the sufferings of the people, SEHEO does its best. In winter, chilling cold comes as curse for those people. SEHEO extends its helping hand during that time providing humanitarian support. Working area of SEHEO experienced bitter cold during the reporting period and it distributed 1,475 pieces of winter cloth such as sweater and blanket to the hard core poor people.

  

Vulnerable Group Development (VGD) Program:

SEHEO has been implementing VGD program, a safety net program of Government, with the financial support of Department of Women and Children Affairs (DWA) under Ministry of Women and Children Affairs. Through the program it provides life skill training and social development training. Through the program SEHEO has been enrolling 5025 beneficiaries. During the reporting period about 4,576 beneficiaries have been trained up on IGAs and other social issues. About Tk. 5, 74,600/- has been deposited to Bank which will be returned to the beneficiaries after completion of the project. Loan amounting to Tk. 10, 05,000/- (Taka Ten Lac Five Thousand) only has been disbursed to the VGD beneficiaries.

 

The following table shows Union wise beneficiaries enrolled by the program:

District	Upazila	No. of Unions	No. of Participants
Magura	Mohammadpur	08	1260
Faridpur	Alfadanga	06	1851
Shylet	Companygonj	09	914
Golapgonj	Golapgonj	06	1000
Total	4	29	5025