Nagar Daridra Basteebashir Unnayan Sangstha (NDBUS)

A team of 45 members of NDBUS visited three pourashava towns on 22, 23 and 25th March 2009. The team in three pourashavas (Sirajganj, Kushtia and Mymensingh) visited CDCs (Community Development Centre), discussed about the procedures of ongoing activities under UPPRP. Prior to the visit, an orientation was conducted on 21st January by the UPPRP at Bengal Cafe, arranged by URBIS Capacity Building Support for NDBUS in Dhaka, Bangladesh. (For details please visit htt p://ndbus.blogspot.com/2009/01/briefing-relating-pre-study-tour-at.html).

With support of the project team and their working relation in the recently completed parliament election, CUS and NDBUS members came into close contact with an influential lawmaker of Dhaka city and appealed to him for ensuring their tenure security. CUS organized a meeting between the URBIS project team, CUS and NDBUS representative in January where DIG team members were also present. As a follow up of this discussion, the project team drafted an anti-eviction bill on 25th January 2009. The bill has already been raised by the Parliamentarian to stop eviction in an inhumanly manner and forwarded to the concerned ministry (Ministry of Land) for vetting. CUS, NDBUS and URBIS team are hopeful that this step will be fruitful in align with commitments of the government for rehabilitation of the urban poor residing in slum and squatter settlements on government land.

A total of 278 primary groups have been contacted during the month after mobilization of data collection. Each primary group consists of 15 members. At present, the database consists of total 4170 persons and summarily they represent nearly 25000 people, considering household size 5.5 persons. English version of the database is complete and it is expected that the Bangla version of the database will be complete by mid March.

First draft of third issue of the newsletter (Year 2, Volume 1) with support from URBIS project contains writings from URBIS team (both English and Bangla) and different training programs held over the quarter. It also contains summary of trainings and workshops organized under the project since inception of the project. The issue also publishes contacts of NDBUS members who are skilled in making bags, handicrafts, showpiece, furniture etc. It is expected that the newsletter will open up new opportunities for expansion of employment opportunities for these members. The team expects a printed version to be available during mid March 2009.

On March 8, 2009 final evaluation of trainees of spoken English held at URBIS Training centre. From the qualified members a few English trainers will provide support in this sector. As majority of students of urban poor groups are weak in English there is a need for teachers with better skills in the field.

On 22 February 2009, the final evaluation of the trainees of mobile servicing and repairing was held at URBIS Training centre. All the trainees (10 in Total) participated in the evaluation. The project is now working on linking employment of successful trainees by helping find contacts for jobs. In this way, the project team is supporting NDBUS initiatives in self-employment.

the final evaluation of trainees of computer hardware and troubleshooting was held at URBIS Training centre. Out of 20, 15 were qualified to appear in the final evaluation.The project from now on will be working for providing employment link of the successful trainees. Besides, the project team will support the NDBUS initiative in guiding their self-employment.

After providing training to three groups consisting of 45 members, NDBUS agreed to select trainers from their own resources on mushroom culture. They will train new members as well as start up mushroom cultivation in a big scale. With a view to select trainers as well as resource person/s among NDBUS members, the project team arranged following selection criteria; i. Interested candidates will have to conduct training at field level in presence of the project trainer for preliminarily qualification; ii. Trainers, after being preliminary qualified, will conduct Mushroom Training at URBIS Training Centre in presence of Project Adviser and a mushroom culture expert; iii. Following the above procedure, the two best ranked persons will be qualified for conducting further mushroom cultivation training for the project and NDBUS. iv. Finally, they have to start up mushroom cultivation in a big scale to prove their knowledge, skills, organizational and motivational capacity and set up an exampl