The signing ceremony of the Financing Agreement and Project Agreement of RELI project

 

 

The signing ceremony of the Financing Agreement between The Economic Relations Division, Ministry of Finance, and The World Bank and Project Agreement between The World Bank and Social Development Foundation (SDF) of Resilience, Entrepreneurship and Livelihood Improvement (RELI) Project was held today on June 27, 2021. On behalf of The Economic Relations Division, Ministry of Finance, Hon’ble Secretary, Ms. Fatima Yasmin signed the Financing Agreement whilst Ms. Mercy Miyang Tembon, World Bank’s Country Director for Bangladesh and Bhutan was her counterpart. Likewise, Ms Tembon also signed the Project Agreement on the part of The World Bank so long as Mr. A Z M Sakhawat Hossain, Managing Director of Social Development Foundation (SDF) coequally signed per procurationem of the implementing agency. Mr. Md. Abdus Samad, Hon’ble Chairperson of SDF and former Senior Secretary was also present in the signing ceremony.

 

Under these agreements, The World Bank will provide USD 300 million to the Government of Bangladesh as Credit through Economic Relations Division, Ministry of Finance to implement the RELI Project scheduled to be started from July 2021 for five years where GoB will chip in USD 40 million making the total project cost USD 340 million. The Project Development Objective (PDO) of the project is ‘to improve livelihoods of the poor and extreme poor, enhance their resilience and support rural entrepreneurship in project areas.’ To predominantly address the emergency economic initiatives of the GoB to fight the COVID-19 crisis and climate-induced events, the RELI project would focus on the livelihood support for the vulnerable and support for their recovery and resilience building, employment generation, entrepreneurship development, and post-crisis economic recovery preparation in the intervening areas. The project is suitably aligned with The Bangladesh Delta Plan (BDP) 2100 and the 8th Five-Year Plan of the Government of Bangladesh.

 

SDF received the highest accolade of innovation from FID, MoF

 

 

Shahidul Islam, Deputy General Manager, SDF receiving award on innovation from Hon’ble Sr. Secretary, FID, Ministry of Finance

 

As a part of the Annual Innovation Work Plan 2020-21, The Financial Institutions Division (FID) of the Ministry of Finance (MoF) organized an awards ceremony to reward the best innovation concepts on June 16, 2021 at their conference hall. With a view to propagate the idea of innovation in simplifying service delivery in the least possible time, the awards and knowledge sharing ceremony was chaired by Mr Md. Ashadul Islam, Hon’ble Senior Secretary of FID. Among other top-ranking officials of the Ministry, Mr.Arijit Chowdhury, Additional Secretary, Mr.Mofizuddin Ahmed, Additional Secretary and Chief Innovation Officer, and other Additional and Joint Secretaries were also present in the ceremony. 

 

Five (5) of the fifty (50) innovative ideas already been piloted and implemented successfully by Bangladesh Bank, Sonali Bank, Investment Corporation of Bangladesh, JibonBima Corporation and Social Development Foundation (SDF) were appraised and selected by the FID as the best innovative concepts to hand over awards in recognition of their work. Accordingly, SDF received the highest accolade of innovation and was awarded a crest for the idea of “Establishing group-based Cafeteria led by Youth entrepreneurs and Creating employment for the unemployed extreme poor and poor youths”. The innovative idea of setting up a Cafeteria was successfully piloted in Chief Magistrate court Bhaban, Satkhira with the aim to ensure quality food in consideration of fair price for all through building supply chain between producer groups and consumers and thus sharing group liabilities. The personnel of SDF behind the innovative concept are Md. Shahidul Islam, Deputy General Manager, Youth Employment, Mr.Uttam Chowdhury, Officer, Youth and Employment, Mr. Md. Abul Kalam Azad, District Coordinator, Satkhira and Mr. Md. Jahangir Hasan, District Officer, Sathkhira.