Happy Homes
ActionAid works with vulnerable communities and helps them to identify the risks they face, their vulnerabilities to natural disasters, and understand their capacities to cope better.
Core Areas Include:
• Building community resilience through defending commons, diversified and adaptive livelihoods and making institutions responsive and accountable in rural and urban spaces
• Strengthen leadership of women and young people to lead humanitarian response, recovery and preparedness that contributes to resilience.
• Facilitate social justice movements for environmental justice, including climate justice at all levels
ActionAid provides a safe shelter and support for 150 girls. They work to give the girls shelter, improved health, and their well-being through providing education and recreation. The girls are also provided with vocational training for a secured future. The 'Happy Home' initiative has been working with various government agencies (i.e schools, vocational training schools) since 2016 in the Dhaka division. They mainly work with the street children in the Mohammadpur area focusing on providing shelter and education - the stable and loving environment which all children need.
Name Of The Initiative Happy Home
Villages Reached N/A
Allied Organisation Various government agencies (i.e schools, vocational training schools)
Blocks Reached Mohammadpur
Working together since 2016 Districts Reached Dhaka
Division Dhaka
Vulnerable Groups Reached Street children
Focus Areas Of Intervention providing shelter and education - and the stable and loving environment which all children need. five separate homes in five different areas of the city, all of them merging into one large home in December 2016.
Liveable City for All
the 6th Urban Dialogue titled 'Liveable City for All' was held on 29 and 30 June 2019 at University of Dhaka focusing on different issues which include road safety, environmental degradation, basic services and provisions, ecological damage, lack of civic responsibility in terms of behavioural issues related to a clean, manageable and liveable city, citizen recognition of the urban poor, shrinking political space for citizens in particular for the young people, safe space for women and children, availability of and accessibility into public easements, disparity in distribution of wealth, and justice in using public tax, among others.
Women and Girls Beyond the Fringe
The Annual Report is but a glimpse into the life of ActionAid Bangladesh (AAB). While it is not possible to do justice to the entire gamut of our activities in one report, we invite the reader to a brief tour of our world through these pages.
Cartoons have always been an effective medium to make strong and meaningful political statements which are easily understood by most people. For this, through this graphic novel, ActionAid Bangladesh has tried to portray the Rohingya refugee crisis, the violence and injustice against refugees through visual artwork.
Observing Public Service Day 2019
In observation of the Public Service Day 2019, Udayankur Seba Sangstha (USS) organised a seminar at Gomnati Union Parishad in Nilphamari with the support of ActionAid Bangladesh. In the seminar, speakers urged to improve efficiency and develop skills of young people through increasing more vocation training opportunities.
ACTIVISTA Bangladesh and ActionAid Bangladesh's Communication Unit in collaboration with United Nations Youth and the Students Association of Bangladesh (UNYSAB) were responsible for planning this unique event.
1981 was the year which officially marked the birth of a pandemic called HIV/AIDS.
Rohingya Women and Girls' Art and Handicrafts Exhibition
Employers' Compliance and Decent Work for Young People
ActionAid Bangladesh jointly with Dhaka Tribune organized a round table discussion 'Decent Work for Young People: Employers' Compliance and Workers' Rights' at Dhaka Tribune conference room on 19 June 2019.
Rohingya Community Observes World Refugee Day 2019
The Rohingya community taking shelter in the camps 11 and 12 of Ukhiya in Cox's Bazar observed the World Refugee Day 2019 with different activities. The observation ceremony started with a rally followed by tree plantation.
SRHR and Nutrition Collaboration Fair
AAB organized a national fair in collaboration with 14 national and international organizations who are working at the grassroots for removing social, economic and structural barriers to SRHR and nutrition rights of women and girls.
Share to Care
'Share to Care' is a fundraising event for Happy Home girls. Every year, ActionAid Bangladesh arranges this very special event to seek the attention of people to donate for Happy Home, a centre for deprived and vulnerable adolescent girls in Dhaka city, for their better future.
ActionAid Bangladesh is going to organize "SRHR and Nutrition Collaboration Fair" to strengthen the relationship of like-minded organizations including NGOs and private sectors and SRHR and nutrition professionals which will contribute to the wellbeing of women and girls related to SRHR and nutritional demand.
Local Learning Sharing
Local Learning Sharing event was started by taking registration and chaired at 9.15 AM at Grand Park Hotel, Barisal division with the honorable Guest, distinguish participant and event organizer. The total participants of this event were 58 people from 15 partner organizations' youth and their representative from division of Barisal, Rajshahi and Rangpur division, 37 Honorable Guest and 10 Media Partners. This event took place on 3rd April of 2019. Guest Ram Chandra Das, Divisional Commissioner, Barisal; Md. Khairul Hasan, Deputy Secretary, Barisal City Corporation, Barisal; Md Akter Iqbal, Additional Deputy Commissioner Barisal and Md. Najmul Hasan, A4I and Young people of Action Aid and Tania Akter Eva of Empire Youth Network of Oxfam was present.
Halt corp
Taking the momentum of November 30, 2017- declared as Tax Day by the government of Bangladesh, a two-week action was planned at the local and national level around corporate taxes and its roles as a key source of revenue to fund public services. The core objectives of this campaign were to raise awareness and generate discussion around issues related to corporate tax avoidance, illicit financial flow and harmful tax incentives, role of corporate taxes as an alternate mechanism of revenue generation vis-à-vis indirect taxes such as VAT. The main demand was "Halt corporate tax avoidance and generate revenue from corporate taxes."
Tax tribunal, Citizens' Tax 2018
ActionAid Bangladesh organized a tax tribunal in 2018 to mobilize people around the issues of dependence of indirect tax as a key source of revenue which is a burden for the poor and corporate tax avoidance; and initiate a dialogue among stakeholders to demand progressive tax policies. The citizens' tax tribunal had three key groups- namely the panel of jury/experts, Plaintiff and Defendant.
Budget Olympiad
An alternative model styled as "Budget Olympiad" was developed to popularize the budget discourse among the young people. Budget Olympiad is mainly a national level contest among young people and students to popularize and stimulate the national budgetary issue. After participating in contests at local level and regional level, the qualified participants gather at National level to take part for final event. The winners are awarded as budget campaigners to move onward with their knowledge and concerns of budget literacy.
The heavy downpour of the last few weeks has triggered floods and water-logging in Satkhira, Khulna and Jessore districts displacing over 1.25 million people with colossal damage to crops, infrastructures and livelihoods.
About 65 million people in the world today are refugees or forcibly displaced according to UNHCR. The reality is grave for a person seeking refuge in another country, who do not have any guarantee of coming back to their own land, which they use to call home once. Kutupalong in Bangladesh is the largest refugee camp in the world right now, sheltering over 800,000 displaced citizens of Myanmar, the majority of which are minors. There were still inadequate facilitates to provide shelter and required lifesaving items to thousands of incoming Rohingya refugees. Children were roaming around everywhere in the makeshift camps, without a clue of what to do.
The current Rohingya population taking refuge in Bangladesh amounts to over 1 million, with the majority comprising women and children. They are one of the most vulnerable groups of people deprived of basic human rights in the world today. Subjected to violence and conflict, and unrecognized as citizens of Myanmar, they first began their exodus across the border into Bangladesh in the 70s, then in the 90s and most recently over the past three years.
In April 2018 ActionAid and partners adopted the Dhaka Declaration at the International Conference on the Rohingya Refugee Crisis and pledged to uphold its clauses. Article 14 of the Declaration holds us committed to 'emphasize the need to constructively build on the strengths of the Rohingya population, particularly women and girls, and engage them as leaders in the design of any future sustainable development solutions in line with the SDGs'.
5th Country Strategy Paper
ActionAid International Bangladesh has entered its fifth strategy period from 2018 to 2022. After successfully ensuring key achievements from the last CSP, AAIB believes the new goals will strengthen the aspiration and confidence of the organisation to work for rights, justice and challenge discrimination of all forms which it has gained over more than three decades through playing pioneering role of advocacy on rights and social justice.
Find the Newsletter-January 2019 here
Water Museum
The first ever 'Water Museum' in Asia is located in Bangladesh's coastal district Patuakhali. 'Water Museum' may sound too futuristic for 2014. Has water become so scarce that we have to preserve it in a museum? Let's find out.
The South Asia Women's Resilience Index
South Asia has been affected by a number of disasters in recent years—natural, economic and conflict-related—drawing attention to the region's vulnerability and pushing disaster risk reduction (DRR) and resilience up development and policymaking agendas. The role of women in DRR and building resilient communities has received less attention than it deserves. Among other reasons, limited mobility and the socially assigned role of women as carers have rendered them more vulnerable than men when disaster strikes. Yet evidence also points towards the ability of women to lead the preparation and response to disruptive events.
Shunanda
Happy Home is a wonderful initiative which has been providing the girl children for a long time. Visiting the home has been an amazing experience for me. Spending time with the children fulfilled me with much positive energy. I am willing to provide for them as much as possible from my side and I expect others will come forward as well to secure a bright and safe future for the Happy Home girls. -Shunanda, Sunsilk Diva and Goodwill Ambassador of Happy Home
Site Management of Camp's in Cox Bazar
The implementation agreement of the project was made between IOM and ActionAid Bangladesh. The initiative aims to provide life-saving site management interventions for the Rohingya refugees in Cox's Bazar. Specifically, this project aims to provide site coordinator and site management activities in camps 11 and 12 and ensure the affected population has access to the required level of assistance and protection.
The current Rohingya population taking refuge in Bangladesh amounts to over 1 million, with the majority comprising women and children. They are one of the most vulnerable groups of people deprived of basic human rights in the world today. Subjected to violence and conflict, and unrecognized as citizens of Myanmar, they first began their exodus across the border into Bangladesh in the 70s, then in the 90s and most recently over the past three years. Before August 2017, there were about 300,000 Rohingyas residing in camps in Cox's Bazar in southern Bangladesh.