Char Fasson Upazilla, Bangladesh – Char Fasson in Bhola island, Bangladesh lags behind in many socio-economic indicators. The majority of the residents in the area live off on fishing and farming. However, fishers and farmers face a lot of problems when it comes to their livelihood including lack of access to proper information related to farming and fishing.
To deal with this situation, MTCP2 Bangladesh partnered with Radio Meghna, a community radio in the area that operated 24 hours a day. MTCP2 seized the opportunity to use the influence of this community radio for the development of farmers and fishers in Char Fasson by supporting the radio to broadcast regular programs that will benefit them. Through the radio station, residents of Char Fasson are now getting regular weather updates like a cyclone.
Another challenge for the fishing community in the area is their limited knowledge when it comes to sustainable fisheries, fishery laws, rules on access to the fishing grounds, government and finance services they can avail of, and even their own rights as fisher people. Because of these, they are exploited by middlemen and influential people in various ways.
To help the fisher people face these challenges, MTCP2 increased their capacities through a regular awareness program broadcasted via Radio Meghna. Fishers can also directly talk with fishery officers from the government through this program,
The farmers of Char Fasson also face various issues including land grabbing, lack of government services, and excessive use of pesticides, among others. Knowledge gap and unavailability of linkages among the farmers and different service providers are also serious problems.
With the intervention of MTCP2, Radio Meghna now broadcasts regular programs focusing on the challenges of the farmers to help them find a way out of these. There are also programs where the farmers themselves participate live on-air and are able to ask questions directly to the service providers.
Because of the efforts of MTCP2 Bangladesh in working with Radio Meghna, the farmers and fishers in Char Fasson now have regular updates on weather, information on agriculture and fishing, the market situation, links to other fishers and farmers as well as service providers and sectors involved in their livelihood, and proper information about various government policies and laws. #
About MTCP2
The Medium-Term Cooperation Program Phase 2 (MTCP2), a five-year capacity building program supported by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), and the European Union (EU), has been implemented in 19 countries across three sub-regions—Southeast Asia, South Asia, and the Pacific—engaging 1,544 sub-national farmers organizations (FOs) with a total membership of around 22 million farmers. The funding support (total budget of $ 5 million for the whole duration of the project across 19 countries) serves as a catalytic fund that will allow FOs to enhance their capacity to be effective channels of economic services to farmers. So far, the program has contributed to the formation of the strong national platform of FOs with improved capacity to engage in policy processes and mobilize resources from mainstream agricultural development programs like extension services, credit, and pre and post-harvest facilities. The program also helped in transforming farmers’ associations into commodity-based cooperatives to strengthen the role of small-scale farmers within an inclusive and sustainable value-chain. The program is being implemented by the consortium Asian Farmers’ Association for Sustainable Rural Development (AFA) and La Via Campesina (LVC).
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